


Play the Odds

by alivingfire



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: - denoted in the text if you want to skip that section, Alternate Universe - College/University, Bets & Wagers, Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Second Kiss, i used the word 'kiss' approximately 4 billion times in this fic, so apologies for that, third kiss, you get the gist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-11 01:46:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8948758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alivingfire/pseuds/alivingfire
Summary: Harry and Louis are best friends since childhood who, after a night of drinking, find themselves locked in a bet: first one to kiss the other a thousand times wins. Wins what? They don't know. Glory, Harry supposes. Bragging rights, though those don't do much in this economy. All Harry knows is that this is one bet he can finally win. What he doesn't expect, though, is what happens when he starts kissing his best friend on a daily basis. Namely, he doesn't expect falling head over heels in love with his best friend. Now all he has to do is make sure the bet never ends, so he never has to stop kissing Louis.





	

**Author's Note:**

> oh my god, i did it again.
> 
> thanks and also send your curses to [j](http://paynner.tumblr.com/) for throwing this dream of a prompt out in front of me. this hasn't been betaed or britpicked by anything other than my own two tired eyes, so if you catch anything wildly wrong, please feel free to let me know! 
> 
> i've been asked to note where any sexual content will be mentioned. as you can probably tell, this is a kissing fic, so i'm assuming you're okay with reading kisses if you start this. there's one actual sex scene, and i've denoted it with a **bolded line** of text. if you still don't want to mess with it, hit me up and i'll let you know when to stop and start. this is for jay, because i think she'd agree that we need a lot less hate in the world, and a lot more kissing.  <3

_November_

It starts, as things sometimes do, as an alcohol-fueled bet.

“Did…” Louis asks incredulously, leaning heavily across the table, breath swirled with liquor and laughter. “Did you just…”

Harry grins, because that’s his automatic response to all things Louis. Nothing else feels quite as natural, if he’s being honest, and he always makes it a point to be honest. Louis throws his new red jumper into Harry’s laundry and all his socks are now pink? Harry grins. Louis gets bored with pranking Liam (“He _cried,_ Haz. Actual tears. It’s embarrassing, honestly.” “Well, you did put Nair in his body wash.” “And?? If anything, I saved him the pain of waxing his chest.” “He’s _allergic,_ Louis.”) and turns to his tried-and-true prank recipient for the past few years, Harry? He grins. Louis gets himself into some ill-thought-out scheme and finds himself stranded somewhere he shouldn’t be, like on top of the clock tower next to the library or stuck in the basement at their favorite pub or the middle of a field near Hempstead? Harry grins, hangs up the phone, and figures out how he’s going to rescue Louis this time around.

It’s what Harry’s always done, after all. It’s what he’ll always do.  

“Niall,” Louis is saying. He’s sloppy from alcohol, uncoordinated and sweaty, his fringe stuck to his forehead. He’s half-laid across the tabletop now, forearms resting between the empty basket that used to hold a mound of chips and their third (or fourth? fifth, maybe) pitcher of beer. He’s also patting insistently at Niall’s forearm. _“Niall._ Didja hear this? Didja — Niall, ‘re you listenin’ to me? Horan. Nialler. He said- Harry, he said tha’ he could win a bet ‘gainst me. Can you believe? Niall. _Niall._ He _said_ that.”

Niall, who has clearly missed all of this, doesn’t look away from the little television screen above the bar as he pours himself another round, amber expertly sloshing into his glass. “Uh-huh,” he says distractedly. “That’s great, Lou.”

“It is _not,”_ Louis mutters mutinously, but he’s given up on Niall and turned back to the source of his affront. “Harry. Lad. Let’s — _hic_ — let’s be realistic, ‘ere.”

“Hmm?” Harry says, lifting his glass to his mouth and trying to hide the grin still lurking there.

“You’ve lots ‘f skills, love,” Louis continues, eyebrows arched in commiseration. He tries to pat Harry’s hand and misses, smacking the table instead. Harry giggles, but Louis pretends that was on purpose and keeps tapping arrhythmically at the table. “Lots of ‘em. But I‘ve won ev’ry bet we’ve _ev’r_ had with each other.”

“How d’you know that?” Harry argues. Where Louis slurs, Harry slows, words dripping like honey stuck to molasses, vowels tangled up in sticky liquor. “D’you keep a record?”

“No,” Louis says. “But ‘f I’d lost, I’d prob’ly never bet ‘gainst you again. And I do. So.”

“I can win,” Harry insists, syllables fuzzy on his tongue. He sips at his drink again, hoping that’ll help.  

Louis snorts and leans back, flipping his hair out of his eyes. “Tha’s, tha’s funny. S’funny, Haz. Love a good sense ‘f humor, I do.”

“I can!” Harry says. “I’ve just been, like. Unlucky. In the…” he waves his hand, looking for the word. “Past.”

Louis scoffs, but his eyes are bright in the dim light of the pub. “Sure, Curly. Unlucky when — _hic_ — it came to ev’ry single bet ov’r the course of…” He stops, brow furrowed. “‘ow long’ve we been mates?”

“Uh.” More years than Harry has fingers, he’s pretty sure. He counts backwards on his own two hands, runs out of space, and reaches over for Niall’s fingers and counts there as well. Niall lets his hand be used, his eyes still glued to the football on the screen as Harry maneuvers him where he wants. “Twelve years.”   

“Twelve ‘ole years, ‘nd you’ve nev’r won a bet,” Louis _tsks,_ shaking his head in mock sympathy _._ “What a shame.”

 _“You’re_ a shame,” Harry shoots back, except it takes a good fifteen seconds before the words tumble out of his mouth. Louis laughs, bright and loud and echoing, and toasts Harry for that before swallowing the last of his drink.

“What’d I miss?” Liam asks, sliding back into the booth.

“Liam!” Louis exclaims, crawling half on top of the table again to reach his new audience. “Liam. Payno. Guess wha’ Harry said.”

Liam leans back a little, bemused. He’s completely sober, has an early work shift tomorrow, and he looks like he regrets that, just a little. “What did he say?”

“He said,” Louis says, then hiccups again, shoulders jumping with the little squeaky noise, “he said he could win a bet agains’ me. Agains’ _me._ Bet King. King of Bets… and beer. And nachos. Liam, I’m hungry.”

“We’ve already had chips, Lou, you don’t need more food,” Liam says, a quick grin tucked in the corner of his mouth. “And as for the bet, well. I guess it would depend on what you were betting, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes,” Harry agrees, nodding. He tries to drink from his pint but it’s empty. He frowns down at the bottom of the glass until a hand reaches out and takes it from him, an exasperated Louis pouring the last of the pitcher into his glass and only spilling a little onto the table and Harry’s lap. “‘nks, Lou.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Louis says, but winks at Harry. “Anyway.” He points at Liam. “No, it doesn’ matter what the bet is. I will — _hic_ — win.”

“I c’n... lift more weight than you,” Harry points out.

“‘kay,” Louis shrugs. “Tha’s easy. I jus’ won’t bet agains’ you in a weightliftin’ competition.”

“I... play more instruments,” Harry says.

“Sssure, true.”  

“I’m taller, too,” Harry says. “So I c’n reach higher shelves without a ladder-”

“Watch it, Curly,” Louis warns.

Niall chuckles a little, patting Louis’ head without looking away from the TV. Liam watches the back and forth like a spectator at an aggressively quick relay race. Back and forth. Back and forth.

“‘sides,” Louis continues as Harry blinks, trying to keep his head from spinning as he watches Liam watch them. Back and forth. “I c’n list things ‘m better at than you, too. ‘m faster.”

Well. “Debate…” There’s a second half to this word, but Harry’s lost it. Wait, it’s, “...able.” Debatable. Yeah.

“‘m better at footie. _And_ FIFA. Both ‘f those, I get two points.”

“We’re not keeping score.”

“My hair’s better.”

_“What.”_

Louis grins, sensing a weakness. “Niall agrees. Don’tcha, Nialler? He told me so.”

“Leave me out of this,” Niall mutters.

“Yeah, well,” Harry blusters, throwing his mind around for something to use, _anything_. “I’m a better kisser!”

Liam chokes on the water he was drinking and that now is all down his front, and Niall whips his head away from the TV for the first time, snorting with laughter.

“You what?” he asks, grinning. “How do you know? Do you go find people Louis s’already snogged and give them a go, then ask ‘em to fill out a survey at the end?”

“No,” Harry says, but it’s too late, he can already see the wheels turning in his friends’ heads as they come up with new and exciting ways to embarrass him for this. “That’s not… What I meant was…”

“Harry,” Liam says, lips pinched to hold the laughter in. “Is there something you need to tell us?”

 _“No,”_ Harry groans, letting his head thump against the table. “I meant…” His mind is being incredibly unhelpful now, not giving him any sort of end to the sentence he’s started that isn’t already more ridiculous than claiming he’s a better kisser when, in all reality, there’s no way to decide that. “I meant that… I… have kissed _more_ people.”

There. That’s better, right?

“Oh my god,” Louis says faintly, looking as though Harry has given him the best gift he could ever ask for. Liam splutters with laughter next to him, and so does Niall, their table drawing attention even across the noisy pub.

So. Apparently, that’s not better at all.

“Harry, mate,” Niall cackles, “you shoulda stopped when you were ahead.”

“What I _meant_ -”

“No, no no,” Louis interrupts, wagging his finger and still grinning so hard his cheeks look ready to split. “You do _not_ get t’ take this from me. I am gonna hold ont’ this f’rever.”

“Well,” Harry challenges. “Maybe I _am_ the better kisser.”

“Harry, _no,”_ Liam says, dropping his face into his hands.

“Harry yes,” Harry says staunchly.

Louis looks thrilled, albeit a bit wobbly from all the beer. “Harry Shtyles,” he slurs, voice a delighted blur. “S’that a _bet?”_

“No,” Niall cuts in, though he’s still giggling.

“No,” Liam advises, though he too looks to be on the verge of laughter.

“No?” Louis challenges.

Harry shouldn’t.

“Yes,” he says, then sticks his hand out for Louis to shake.

They order a round of tequila shots to seal the deal, and Harry can't remember anything else that happened that night.

_______________

When Harry wakes, it’s because whatever the skin of his cheek is stuck to is moving, and he’s moving with it. He groans, a low rumble that shakes his brain loose and makes the thudding of his headache rush to his temples, like it had been waiting for him to wake up before it got _really_ painful. His stomach sloshes like he swallowed an ocean sometime between last night and right at this moment.

“What happened,” he moans into whatever is under his face that he’s currently using as a pillow.

“Beer,” answers the pillow, who sounds a lot like Louis. “Lots of beer.”

Harry startles, his cheek unpeeling from the hot surface it was pressed against — oh. That was Louis’ stomach. There’s a red spot right above his bellybutton that proves Harry was nuzzled there for quite some time, their skin tacky and warm.

“Oh, god,” he whimpers, clutching at his head. _“Why.”_

“Why do we do anything, Haz?” Louis mumbles, his arm thrown over his face. “Lack of self control and adult supervision.”

Harry rubs at his eyes. If they’d both stumbled into either one of their beds after a long night out, that wouldn’t have been out of the ordinary. After over a decade of sleepovers and nights spent talking into the early morning, sharing a bed with his best friend is as easy for Harry as falling asleep on his own. This, though, this is a first: the fluorescent lights of the bathroom bounce off the tiled floor, which splinters in Harry’s eyes and make him even more nauseous.

“D’we sleep on the bathroom floor?” Louis asks. He still hasn’t moved, which means he’s in that early stage of his hangover progression where if he shifts even a little, he’ll throw up; Harry’s an expert in navigating Louis’ stages, and he’d recognise that particular green patina on Louis’ skin anywhere.

“Think so,” Harry answers. He rests his forehead against the cool porcelain of the toilet and asks, again, _“Why.”_

“Because you’re idiots, that’s why,” says a voice from the doorway. Harry tilts his head and cracks open one eye, finding Niall standing there looking mightily unimpressed and a hint smug. “Good morning, sleepyheads.”

“Morning?” Harry clarifies.

 _“Good?”_ Louis echoes in disbelief.

“Yes, it is morning,” Niall answers Harry, checking his watch. “9:02, specifically. And yes, Louis, it is good. So, so good.”

“Uh,” Harry says, because Niall’s smile is a little manic and he doesn’t quite know what to do with it. He peeks over at Louis, who has slid open one eye and is watching Harry warily right back. Harry gulps and looks back at Niall. “Why is it so good?”

Niall’s grin widens.

“You made a bet last night,” he says. “And you stuck it on the kitchen wall with super glue, so I think it’s binding.”

“I did what?” Harry asks weakly.

Louis snorts, the sound muffled under his arm.

“I wouldn’t laugh, Lou,” Niall says. “You matched the bet.”

Louis stops laughing.

“What did we bet on?” Harry prods.

“Well,” Niall says, inspecting his nail beds. He’s clearly enjoying every minute of this. “Harry, you bet that you were a better kisser than Louis.”

“Ehm,” Harry says, cringing so hard his face hurts. “That sounds… familiar. What does that mean?”

“Well, we had that discussion last night. See, Louis thought it should be a race — first one to a hundred kisses wins.” Harry opens his mouth to protest, because he’s not just going to _kiss_ people just to win a bet. It has to _mean_ something, that’s what makes a kiss — _his kisses_ — so good. Niall cuts him off before he can interject, though: “And Harry, you said that wouldn’t be a good judge of who was a better kisser, more like who can force themselves on more people without consent.”

Harry’s mouth snaps shut. “Right. Then what happened.”

“Then, Louis said that if you were so unwilling to kiss a hundred strangers to win a bet, then maybe he’d just kiss _you_ a hundred times to shut you up.”

If possible, Louis goes even more still. “I said _what?”_ he croaks, his lips barely moving.

“Yeah,” Niall confirms gleefully. “You said you’d kiss Harry a hundred times because he didn’t want to force himself on a hundred strangers. Don’t worry, it didn’t make sense to us either. You were very drunk.”

Still unmoving, Louis squeezes his eyes shuts and whispers. “Is that all?”

Niall chuckles. “Honestly, I think you should just read your own rules. They’re quite, uh. Well, let’s just say you covered your bases. And you recorded your arguments on paper for posterity. Just in case.”

“I…” Harry trails off, rubbing at the spot between his eyes. “At this point, I don’t think I want to know what that means.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Niall reassures them cheerfully. “Liam and I made you cut the rule about blowjobs being worth twenty-five kisses.”

 _“WHAT,”_ Harry and Louis both shout, and then Louis is going even greener from sitting up so fast and Harry has to launch himself out of the way so Louis can make it to the toilet just in time.

_______________

 ~~_Harry and Louis_ ~~ _LOUIS AND HARRY’S SUPER AWESOME BET  
_ _why do you get to go first       I’M OLDEST THAT’S WHY_

 

_RUlE #1 - THE WINNER IS THE FIRST ONE TO 100 KISSES_   
_That’s not very many_   
_SHUT UP HAROLD_   
_We’ll be ~~finshed finised~~ done in two days. . We need sometihng thAt takes effort_   
_FINE 10000_   
_No that’s to ~~o~~ o many_   
_1000  
     Ok_

 

_THE WINNER IS THE FIRST ONE TO 1000 KISSES_

 

_Rule 2. ~~HAROLD~~ AND ~~LOUIS~~ quit writing Harold, that’s not my name IT IS NOW no!_   
_HAROLD AND Lewis hahA I win_   
_are the only Two participants. Kisses from mums, sisters, NIall, Liam, or anyone else don’t count_   
_******no problem there, mate.** _   
_SHUT UP NEIL YOU WISH YOU COULD GET AT THIS LAD YOUD HAVE TO GET IN LINE I AM T ~~HE B~~ E ~~sT~~ E   ~~V~~ ~~E~~   HARRY QUIT STEALING MY PEN_   
_Give it a rest, Lou_

 

_RULEE 2. ~~PART 2~~ ~~addendum B~~  PART 2_   
_GET OUT OF HERE WITH YOUR FANCY WORDS_   
_ANYWAY. IF HARRY OR LOUIS KISSES SOMEONE WHO ISn’T PART OF THE BET THEY HAVE TO TELL THE OTHER ONE_   
_Why?_   
_BECAUSE THATS FAIR THATS WHY._

_YOUD TELL ME ANYWAY, RIGHT?_

 

 _Rule C._  
_I THOUGHT WE WERE USING NUMBERS, NOT LETTERS  
     oops_

 

_Rule 3. Kisses while Harry ~~and~~ or Louis are asleep or ~~uncn~~ unconscious have to have a ~~wintess~~ witness for pRoof._   
_******i am NOT watching you snog louis while he’s unconscious**_   
_Then what keeps him from sneaking into my room and doing all ~~thuo~~ 1000 kisses at one time??_   
_I WONT_   
_I don’t ~~beleive~~ believe yOu_   
_I WONT !!!!_   
_**Don’t drag us into this to be your witnesses, it’s weird enough already  
**      Thanks for that, Payno _

 

 ~~~~_RULE 4. BONUS ROUND. ONE BLOWJOB = 50 KISSES_  
 _~~Absolutely not!!~~      
__******~~no i draw the line there. that’s too weird~~ **  _  
 _~~BUT WHAT IF SOMEONES LOSING AND NEEDS TO CATCH UP~~_  
 _~~No!!!!!!~~_  
 _~~1 BJ = 25 KISSES?~~_  
 ~~That’s worse!!! No!!!!!!~~  
~~~~FINE

 

_Rule 4. Cheaters are ~~disqalu dsiquali~~ disqualified immediatly_   
_HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO CHEAT??_   
_I don’t know. You’d fInd a way._   
_RUDE_

 

_RULE 5. THE PERSON THAT INITIATES THE KISS GETS THE POINT_   
_What if we don’t  know who sTarted it ?_   
_I DONT KNOW,WE’LL FIGURE IT OUT_   
_We could both  get the point  
YEAH THAT SOUNDS GOOD_

 

_Rule 6. Don’t let it get weird_

 

_RULE 7. AT LEAST 1 KISS PER DAY._   
_Why?_   
_DONT WANT THIS TAKING FOREVER DO WE?_   
_Good point_

  


_We,_ _Harry Edwrad Styles_ _and_ _LOUIS W. “THE TOMMO” TOMLINSON_ _do_ ~~_solemly_ _solmnly_~~ _totally swear this is a real and legit AND BINDING yeah, and binding document._

_WITNESSES:_

**_Niall Horan_ **

~~_NEIL WHOREHAND_ ~~ **_dammit tommo!!_ **

**_Liam James Payne_ **

******_Can I just say I think this is a bad idea?_**  
_No  
_ _QUIET PAYNO_

_______________

Harry stares at the series of pub napkins haphazardly stuck to the wall of their flat, a jaunty collection of what is essentially ink-covered trash decorating what used to be the empty wall next to the refrigerator. The writing from each napkin to the next grows more and more incomprehensible, presumably thanks to time and alcohol; the progression starts with a decently shaky first napkin and advances to the last, nearly unreadable one where a tequila-wasted Harry and Louis decided to sign their names and lock themselves into this nonsense. The rules are gibberish that Harry’s mind can’t seem to wrap around, crossed out and misspelled and interspersed with commentary from himself, Louis, Niall, Liam, and what looks like a random stranger from the bar who commented _this is so cute! xx_ on the corner of the fourth napkin.

“Wow,” Louis says from next to him. He’s significantly less green, but that might be due to the litres of water Harry made him drink and keep down before they ever left the bathroom.

(It’s nearing noon, now. It was a long process.)

“Yeah, I… yeah.”

Niall is hovering in the doorway, watching them with poorly disguised glee. “So?”

“So what, Horan?” Louis asks.

“Are you gonna do it?”

Louis scoffs, but doesn’t say anything else. When Harry flickers a glance at him, he’s watching Harry too, waiting for an answer. They grin, then shift their glances away.

“We’ve done some pretty ridiculous stuff throughout the years,” Harry offers awkwardly, but it's pretty weak even in his own ears. This isn't like drawing beards on their faces with permanent markers when they were nine and seven because they wanted to be pirates, or the time Harry’s boyfriend cheated on him so Louis came up with a plan to break into his car and leave raw fish so it would smell terrible after a warm summer day.

This is different; with all their previous schemes, there was an edge of excitement to it all, something that curled around Harry's spine and made him invincible at Louis’ side. This is different because he doesn’t want to do it at all, really; everyone in the world knows you don’t mix kisses and best friends. It’s like water and oil, fire and kerosene; everything can only end in ash. Especially lifelong best friends who everyone — including the irritatingly jovial Irishman bouncing in excitement nearby — already thinks are somehow secretly in love with each other and have been for years anyway.

“Yeah,” Louis answers after a minute. His hip is propped up against the kitchen table, his hair flattened in the back from the bathroom floor. “This might top the list, though.”

“We don’t have to do it,” Harry points out. “Despite what we apparently wrote last night, a pub napkin covered in pen scribbles isn’t a binding contract.”

“Oh,” Louis says. “Yeah. That’s true.”

Then he does something, something so absolutely, infuriatingly _Louis,_ that for a second Harry can only stare, amazed.

And this is what he does: he tilts his head toward Harry, eyes red and sleepy and about as innocent as the crocodile who ate Hook’s hand, and he says, “Of course, _I_ don’t mind following through. But if you want to back out…”

No.

No no no. That’s not what Harry meant, that’s not—

 _God,_ over a decade of friendship is just enough to arm Louis with the exact ammo he needs to twist Harry into knots. It’s not that he doesn’t want to _do_ this! It’s just- it’s just that he doesn’t _want_ to… do this.

“Oh, no, I was just thinking of you,” Harry says when his brain finally unscrambles itself. It’s a lie, it’s a blatant lie, everyone in here knows it. Liam’s not even here, he’s at work, and he still probably knows it. Even Harry’s mum all the way in Manchester probably got hit with the shiver that means _Harry’s lying_ . Louis’ eyebrows lift slowly in surprise; he’s like a shark in the water who’s mildly impressed that the person he bit is putting up a fight. Still, Harry tries. “I thought _you_ weren’t comfortable with it-”

“No no, I’m comfortable,” Louis butts in. “I was trying to be considerate for _your_ sake.”

“Well, don’t bother.” Harry’s brain is flashing warning signs at him, _STOP, STOP, THIS IS A BAD IDEA, STOP,_ and Niall is making little squeaks of excitement because they’ve just guaranteed him at _least_ a solid month of entertainment, and Louis’ smile is widening by the second, as though he knows every word bouncing through Harry’s mind. Harry should say no.

But Harry _can’t_ just say no, he can’t back out _now._ He’s in too deep. So:

“I’m fine. This is… yeah, this is fine.”

“Great. I’m fine too.”

“Cool.”

“So we’re doing this.”

“Apparently so.”

“You, uh,” Niall breaks in, and that’s the first time Harry realises he and Louis have pivoted to face each other, nearly toe-to-toe like boxers being weighed for a prize fight. Niall looks back and forth between them before holding out two more crumpled, beer-stained napkins. “You made your own tally sheets, last night. Thought you might want to hang them up to keep track.”

Harry takes his from Niall as Louis does the same. Harry almost wants to laugh, because this just about sums it up, doesn’t it? A crummy, balled-up bit of paper covered in drunken scribbles, but that he and Louis are pretending are of actual, real-life importance.  

Louis meets Harry’s eyes, takes the piece of tape Niall is offering, and smacks his tally sheet onto the wall without ever looking away from Harry. Harry tries to do the same but misses, his face heating as he fumbles and drops the napkin, his tape folding over and sticking to itself. He gets it up there eventually, though, stuck on the wall amongst their nonsensical rules and witness signatures.

“Shake on it?” Louis offers.

“Wouldn’t it make more sense to kiss on it?” Niall suggests, and Harry just might murder him for aiding and abetting this whole nightmare.

But he doesn’t. Instead, Harry leans in at the same time as Louis, pecking a quick, embarrassed kiss to each other’s lips, perfunctory and awkward before pulling away.

And then they both put marks on their tally sheets, pretending they don’t hear Niall snickering in the background.

_1 - 1._

_______________

Later, Harry makes the mistake of doing the math.

He figures, based on the PDA in his various relationships throughout the years, and combining that with the amount of time he and Louis spend with each other on a daily basis, that they could each probably comfortably fit in about eight kisses a day.

Eight kisses a day would mean it would take 125 days before one of them hits a thousand.

That’s- that’s a lot of days. That’s like four _months._ Even if they bump it up to ten a day, that’s still a hundred days, which isn’t much shorter.

And that’s to say nothing of technique; because, as with all things, Louis is treating this whole bet with the competitive intensity of an Olympian. He smacks kisses on Harry’s cheeks and then runs away before Harry can reciprocate, laughing all the while. He carries his tally sheet with him everywhere like some sort of talisman, a pen at the ready in case he spots an opportunity where Harry is caught unawares and he can swoop in for a top-of-the-head kiss or a peck to Harry’s nose.

So, within the first two days of their bet, Harry has had to improvise so as not to lose before this thing has really begun. He doesn’t enter a room without checking the corners like a sniper searching for elusive Louises in his midst. Louis sleeps like the dead, so Harry makes up a lot of ground when Louis takes a nap in front of the TV. Harry gets used to grabbing automatically at Louis’ jacket or shirt when he tries to scamper off after a sneak attack, spinning him around and caging him up against a wall, pressing kisses to Louis’ face until he wriggles free.

In fact, that’s what he’s doing when Liam comes home from work at the end of the first day of the bet, his arm hard across Louis’ sternum as Louis laughs hysterically, kicking at Harry’s shins to let him go as Harry brushes a couple of kisses across his cheekbones.

“Guys, guys, whoa, what’s going on?” Liam says in alarm, pulling Harry back so Louis can get away, crowing triumphantly and making faces at Harry behind Liam’s back. “Are you _fighting?”_

Harry, ignoring that bit of nonsense, shouts after Louis, “I still got three that time!”

“And you’re still behind, too! Seven to five now, isn’t it?” Louis trills, slipping into the kitchen on sock feet.

“Oh my god, is this about that stupid bet?” Liam asks faintly. “I thought you were too drunk to remember.”

“Niall reminded us,” Harry says, absently righting his clothing, which is all askew from trying to hold Louis still. Liam watches him for a minute, and Harry can _feel_ the disapproval radiating off of him.

“Harry…”

“What?” Harry bites out. He _could_ point out that Niall and Louis coerced him into this, that it’s not his fault this stupid bet is happening, but… well, Liam can fuck off. He and Louis are having fun, and it’s not _weird;_ well, it is weird, a little, but Harry will push the awkwardness aside if it means he can win. Plus, he hasn’t seen Louis laugh like this for months; uni is stressful, and anything that makes Louis laugh until he can’t breathe is a good decision in Harry’s book.

“I just can’t believe it,” Liam says as Harry stretches onto his tiptoes to see if he can still spot Louis lingering nearby or if he’s barricaded himself in his room. “You’re actually going through with this, then.”

“No, Liam,” Harry says, patting at Liam’s shoulder. “I’m not just going through with this. I’m going to _win_ this.”

Louis barks a sarcastic laugh from the kitchen, and Harry runs after him, hoping to catch his slippery best friend and plant at least another kiss on him before the day is done.

_5 - 7._

_______________

The manic pace of the first two days (eight kisses in total for Harry on Saturday, nine on Sunday) dwindles as Monday arrives and Harry and Louis have to attend to real life and actual responsibilities beyond chasing each other around and annoying their friends.  

Harry gets a kiss on the back of his bare shoulder as Louis reaches in the cupboard for cereal, and he finds Louis’ forehead for a quick one as he’s heading out the door, but then they part ways and it’s life as usual.

It’s almost like the weekend was a weird dream, some sort of stress-caused hallucination that tricked Harry into thinking he had to kiss his childhood-into-adulthood best friend or he’d forsake all his honor. That doesn’t _sound_ like something he’d do, after all; they didn’t even decide on a prize for the winner. Just bragging rights, Harry supposes, though that won’t buy much in this economy. Still, though he’d love a chance to come out on top for once against Louis, Harry didn’t _actually_ agree to a race to a thousand kisses, right?

_Right?_

When he’s attacked by an enthusiastic pair of lips attached to the wildest hurricane of a boy at the doorway to their flat at the end of the day, Harry realises it wasn’t actually a dream after all.

He gives himself five seconds to internalise, then he starts planning out ways to retaliate.

_21 - 20._

_______________

“Total comes up to nineteen pounds fifty,” Harry says, handing the harassed mother across from him her receipt, wincing in sympathy as the screaming toddler on her hip wraps his little fists around a chunk of her hair and pulls. She sends a pained smile in his direction then scuttles away, trying to unwind her hair from her son’s grip and also trying to balance bags full of milk and nappies and that chocolate bar she’d thrown in and stared at while Harry scanned it as though it was the only thing keeping her sane.

“Hello, Mr Styles,” says a crotchety voice, and Harry grins as he turns to his next customer.

“Mrs Bagman!” he says cheerfully. “Lovely day, isn’t it?”

“Bit rainy for my taste, love, but it’ll do.” Mrs Bagman is approximately a thousand years old, and she’s been coming to this grocery shop every Thursday since before there was even a building here, Harry’s pretty sure. When it was just a bit of a field outside a medieval village, Harry bets this is where Mrs. Bagman planted her vegetables and kept her chickens, and then several centuries passed and someone built a grocer’s and so she just shrugged and adjusted to the change. When Harry was still in training, she was more likely to know the answers to his questions than the other teenagers training him, and he’s had a soft spot for her ever since the time she sneaked her cat into the store inside her purse while her flat was being fumigated.

Harry starts scanning her little stack of items, arranging the loaf of bread and the box of tea and the tins of cat food (exactly seven of them, just like the week before, and the week before that, stretching back to eternity) precisely the way she likes it. They chat about Harry’s studies — “Glad to see you’re still going strong, dear” — and Mrs Bagman’s cat, Agnes — “Oh, just fine, just fine. The damp makes our joints hurt, you know, so we mostly stay in these days” — until Mrs Bagman turns with a sly smile that belies her years and sends Harry a wink.

“Your young man is here, I believe,” she says, raising a cheeky eyebrow.

Harry frowns, confused. “I don’t have a-”

“Harold!”

Harry startles, nearly dropping Mrs Bagman’s tin of beans as he whips around to find Louis there behind him, the shoulders and hood of his jacket wet from the rain outside. His eyes are bright, his grin infectious.

“Hey, Lou,” he says, his heart still thudding from the surprise. “What’s up?”

“Liam asked me to pop in and grab some jam, we’re all out,” Louis says. “And he didn’t know if you’d check your phone before you left.”

“Oh,” Harry says. “Yeah, probably wouldn’t have thought of it. Aisle four.”

Louis sends him a disparaging look, as though to say _I know where the jam is, Harry Styles,_ even though Harry _knows_ it’s been six months since Louis actually did any of their shopping, and then he turns and walks away. He’s got both hands clutching at the straps of his backpack, his sweatpants pushed up above his ankles so his white socks — not so white anymore, flecked with rainwater and mud — are visible. Harry watches in amusement as Louis pretends he isn’t looking up towards the signs hanging from the ceiling, and then takes an abrupt right toward aisle four as though he knew where it was all along.

There’s a polite, if laughter-tinged, cough behind Harry, and that’s the exact moment he remembers he’s halfway through Mrs Bagman’s order. “No rush, now, love,” she says, eyes sparkling behind her thick glasses, the cat-eyed frames so old they’re almost chic somehow.

Harry clears his throat, feeling his cheeks flush. Louis doesn’t necessary hang around while Harry’s at work — the shop owner, like everyone else, loves Louis and allows for quite a bit, but even so it’s not like there’s a place for him to stay that wouldn’t be inconvenient — but he does pop in from time to time, and Harry’s not surprised Mrs Bagman recognised him.

Still.

“That’s, erm,” Harry mumbles, half-hoping Mrs Bagman doesn’t hear his feeble excuse. It’s not that he’s embarrassed to say Louis isn’t his boyfriend, or whatever… but something is making him not want to correct her. “That’s not my- my young man.”

“Hmph,” Mrs Bagman sniffs. “Are you disputing the young man part, or the part where he’s yours?”

From aisle four, Harry hears a sing-songed, “Haaaazza! What kind of jam do we usually get?”

Harry determinedly avoids Mrs Bagman’s raised eyebrow, sighs, and calls, “Liam likes strawberry, but you and Niall always eat the raspberry.”

“Oh,” Harry hears. A pause, then, “What kind do you like?”

Mrs Bagman chuckles, and Harry drops his head into his hands, groaning. “It doesn’t matter, Lou.”

He’s fervently happy that the shop is mostly empty, thanks to the lateness of the hour, because Louis isn’t worried about a single thing when he shouts back, “No no, I know there’s something you like. It’s gotta be here, I think it’s…”

“Oh my god,” Harry says pleadingly, “okay, fine, it’s-”

“No, don’t tell me!” Louis interrupts. “I’m gonna figure it out.” And then he goes quiet, probably reading every single jar label to find the one that fits Harry the most.

“Like I said,” Mrs Bagman says lightly, holding out the cash to pay for her long-delayed groceries. “Your young man is here, and he’s working hard to earn your attention. He must love you a lot.”

“You’ve got the wrong idea, Mrs Bagman,” Harry insists weakly, bagging her cat food.

“Got it!” Louis announces before she can reply. He bounces out of aisle four, holding three jars. He sidles up next to Harry and grabs a plastic bag from Harry’s stash, dumping the jars inside with a teeth-rattling crash of glass. “See, I remember your mum having tea and scones waiting for us when we went over to your house after school.” He says this smugly, like his knowledge of Harry and their shared history is something that gives him an edge over others, somehow. “And you never liked jam, did you? You like” — he rummages inside the bag, jars clinking, and pulls one out triumphantly — “orange marmalade!”

Harry rolls his eyes but he can’t really dispute it, seeing as how, well, he’s absolutely correct. But he’s not going to _tell_ him, oh no: Louis is far too self-satisfied on his own without Harry’s help.

“Knew it,” Louis grins when Harry doesn’t immediately dispute it. “Also, hey, I forgot I don’t have any money. Can you pay for these when you leave for the night?” Harry opens his mouth to answer, but Louis cuts him off. “Thank you!”

Then he swoops in, pressing a loud, smacking kiss to Harry’s cheek. He dances back, laughter bright in his eyes, and looks Harry up and down. “You look sexy in that apron,” he smirks, then backs out the door announcing, “Love you Hazza! See you at home!”

Mrs Bagman doesn't say a word, but her grin is wily as she accepts her bags of beans and bread and cat food. Harry, for his part, thinks he'll never stop blushing.

“Have a good night, dear,” Mrs Bagman says archly.

“Good night, Mrs Bagman.”

Harry slumps back against the till when she's gone, his face hot where Louis’ lips touched. His phone buzzes in his pocket, and he blankly pulls it out and unlocks it, Louis’ name on the screen making his heart thump like Mrs Bagman is reading over his shoulder.

 **_Louis:_ ** _that's 37 for me i think  
_ **_Louis:_ ** _:)_

Harry vows to ignore him. And Mrs Bagman. And his friend Jesy over at the next till, whose face is red from laughter.

Harry also vows, then and there, that somewhere between kiss thirty-eight and kiss one thousand, he _will_ make Louis pay for this.

_35 - 37._

_______________

“I’m heading to bed, lads,” Louis yawns, his hair wild from where he’s been clenching his fingers in frustration throughout the Rovers match. When he stands, he scatters a couple of empty bottles and crisp packets, the remnants of a night in spread over the coffee table.

“Wait, Lou,” Harry says, motioning Louis over. “C’mere.”

Louis doesn’t hesitate, just picks his way around Liam’s outstretched legs on the way to Harry, his sleepy eyes barely open. Harry grabs at Louis’ wrists and bounces up in his seat to kiss Louis right on the nose, settling back into the sofa with satisfaction. Louis’ eyes flutter all the way open, his mouth parted in surprise.

“Fifty-six,” Harry says with a grin. “G’night, Lou.”

Still looking stunned, Louis says, “Good night,” and walks away without putting up a fight. Harry’s smile widens, tucking that away for later. It’s quiet when he’s gone, and Harry turns to finding Liam and Niall watching with wide eyes.

“What?” he asks, and they exchange a look but don’t elaborate.

“Nothing,” Liam says.

Harry doesn’t believe him, but he’s too chuffed with himself to prod for more.

_56 - 53._

_______________

As it turns out, even repetition of the least normal thing in the world can become routine, and it only takes a few weeks for Harry and Louis find themselves in a holding pattern.

Two kisses at breakfast: one when Louis stumbles out of his bedroom, rubbing his eyes, and ambles over to Harry. Quick traded pecks to Harry’s cheek and Louis’ forehead, simple and fast to avoid any morning breath issues, and then it’s done. And then another set of kisses when Harry stands from the table, taking his and Louis’ plates to the sink to be washed later — sometimes Louis does this part and starts washing them right away, when he’s feeling generous — and picking up his messenger bag by the table.

“Bye, Lou,” Harry says every day, before swooping down to press a kiss to the arch of Louis’ cheekbone. This one lasts longer, and Harry doesn’t know why, but it’s part of the routine now. He stands there, lips pressed to Louis for a second, two, three, then pulls back. “Have a good day.”

“Bye, Haz,” Louis murmurs, lifting up onto his tiptoes to return the favor. His kisses usually land a little closer to Harry’s lips, low on his cheek next to the corner of Harry’s mouth.

After that, Harry marks two new tally marks on each of their score sheets and heads out the door.

“I thought this was a competition?” Liam asks one morning when his breakfast intersects with Harry and Louis’ little routine. Neither of them really had an answer for that — Harry leaned over and stole a slice of bacon, and Louis flipped him off, crunching a mouthful of cereal — but it bugged Harry later, niggling at him from the back of his head.

He supposes Liam has a point, after all. This bet went from a race against the clock, stealing kisses when the other couldn’t retaliate, to some sort of platonic boyfriends domestic routine within just a few weeks.

Harry picks at that thought through his entire Renaissance Lit class, until the guy who sits next to him, Isaiah, prods at his shoulder and laughs when he jumps.

“Hey, mate,” he grins. “Class is over. Thought you might want to, you know, leave. Maybe.”

Harry blinks and looks around, only to find Isaiah isn’t lying, and the lecture hall is slowly emptying around him, a few girls catching Harry’s eye and giggling as they pass. He wipes awkwardly at his face, wondering if he was drooling or something, and Isaiah snorts.

“They aren’t laughing at your face,” he says, grabbing Harry’s bag and hoisting it onto his own shoulder, then offering a hand to Harry to help him up. “It’s your hair. Looks like you were mauled by a wild bear.”

Well, that would be Louis’ fault, then; after Liam made his snarky comment about this whole thing being a competition, not a kiss exchange, Louis nearly tackled Harry on his way out the door, pressing five or six kisses to Harry’s jaw and keeping him in place with a hand wound through Harry’s hair. By the time Harry wriggled free, Louis was gone, and Harry was two minutes late for class.

“Oh,” Harry says dumbly, tripping over his feet a little as he follows Isaiah out of the building. A guy Harry’s never talked to before passes the two of them, takes one look at Harry’s hair, and holds out his hand for a fist bump.

“So who’s the lucky lady?” Isaiah asks after the guy gets his fist bump, leaving a trail of silence in his wake.

“Lucky guy, actually,” Harry mutters, and Isaiah’s eyebrows fly up.  

“Is that so?” he muses.

“It wasn’t-” Harry sighs, but for the second time in as many days he’s cut off before he could even begin to explain his and Louis’ weird thing going on.

“Haz!” says the little life-ruiner himself, waving from the entrance to the library. Harry angles himself in that direction and Isaiah follows, a half-step behind. “How was class?”

“Uh, good, I think,” Harry says. “Sort of zoned out for, like. All of it.”

Louis laughs, the one that makes his eyes go crinkly around the edges, and leans over to press the third kiss of the day on Harry’s shoulder. Harry reciprocates (grabs Louis’ hand and puts a kiss there), and is about to ask Louis what he wants to get for lunch when Isaiah clears his throat.

“Oh,” Louis says. “Isaiah, didn’t see you there.”

“Right.” Isaiah shuffles his weight back and forth. “Well. See you later, H.”

“Yeah, ‘course. Bye Isaiah.”

“You’ll have to give him his bag back before you go,” Louis cuts over the end of Harry’s sentence.

“Oh, right, yeah.” Isaiah fumbles with Harry’s messenger bag and slides it off his shoulder, handing it over to him. “Sorry about that. Bye again.” And then he goes, hands deep in his pockets.

Louis watches him go, his eyes narrowed. “I don’t like him.”

Harry laughs, slinging his arm over Louis’ shoulders. “He’s _nice,”_ he chides. “And he’ll be very helpful when I’m having to grovel for his notes on the class I just basically slept through.”

Louis grumbles and tucks himself closer to Harry’s side, fitting into that spot the same way he has since Harry was seventeen and finally taller than him.

Harry presses a kiss to the top of Louis’ head, adding it to his mental tally in his head, and says, “Pizza?”

So that’s how it goes, their routine. One kiss before breakfast, one kiss after breakfast. One when Harry and Louis meet up after their classes end, one after lunch when Louis heads to football practice and Harry has drama club rehearsals. One when they see each other back at the flat. Then it’s a free-for-all between dinner and bedtime, though not nearly as frantic as the first few days. Harry kisses Louis’ cheek when they pass in the hallway, Louis kisses Harry’s nose in thanks for bringing burgers home for dinner, Harry kisses the top of Louis’ head when they’re watching TV. Louis has found one spot he likes in particular, taking Harry’s hand and kissing the inside of his wrist; it’s not an entirely intimate spot, but the skin there is sensitive and Harry shivers every time, which makes Louis laugh.

Either way, no matter how many kisses they get in during the evening, at night they do one more, a kiss goodnight for each of them. They add their tallies to their slowly-filling score sheets, and then start anew in the morning.

So yes, Harry realises later, Liam is right. It is a competition, a race, but it’s a long one. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Harry and Louis still have a good three months and then some before they’ll be close to finishing.

It makes no sense for them to stay on their toes for a hundred and twenty-five days straight. They’d wear themselves out, and uni is hard enough already; they don’t need even more weighing on them. Instead, they’ll keep pace with each other until the finish line is in sight. _Then_ they’ll pick it up and try to win for real.

“It’s easier just to accept his kiss and return my own right away, rather than dodge each other like we’re, I don’t know, wearing poison lipstick or something,” Harry explains to Liam brightly a few days later, stabbing a leaf of lettuce in his salad and waving it idly. “Less tiring, you know? And then our points basically cancel each other out.”

Liam shakes his head like he just can’t wrap his mind around it, but then Louis is walking in, covered in mud and sweat and grass from the footie pitch, and he’s pressing a kiss to Harry’s forehead before stomping off to the shower, leaving a trail of dirt in his path, and Harry has forgotten about anything that isn’t chasing him down to pay him back.

_77 - 81._

_______________

“Coffee for you, good sir,” Louis says with a bow, handing Harry a Starbucks cup and keeping another one cradled to his chest.

“Why thank you,” Harry accepts with a bow, taking a sip and feeling the warmth race down to his toes. He groans a little.

“Hit the spot, did it?” Louis grins.

“I feel like I’ve been out here for decades,” Harry complains. “My toes are gone. _Gone,_ Louis. And who knows about my hands — frostbite, I reckon. I’ll never be the same.” Louis groans out a laugh, and Harry continues, raising his voice dramatically. “I think he forgot about us. Niall was supposed to _be here_ and he’s _not_ and he forgot us. He hates us. He wants to move out of the flat and burn everything we’ve ever given him, I just know it.”

“It’s been twenty minutes,” Louis scoffs, knocking his shoulder against Harry’s. “He doesn’t hate us, he’s just late. You’ll survive a little longer.”

“Will I?” Harry asks. “Will I, though? My body might _technically_ be alive but inside I’ll be nothing; an empty husk, a shell of a man. I’ll never-”

Louis cuts him off with a hand over his mouth and a kiss to his cheek, which startles Harry into silence.

“Jesus,” Louis breathes, shaking his head with laughter. “Thought you’d never shut up.”

Harry glares, and Louis leans up and gives him another, lips against Harry’s frozen nose. He lowers himself from his tiptoes back down to flat feet but doesn’t move out of Harry’s space, the cold air between them heating from their proximity to each other.

“Haz,” Louis says. He’s staring at the tip of Harry’s nose, now, like there’s something there to stare at. Like his lips left some kind of indelible mark. “I-”

“Oi, it’s not _that_ cold, budge up, c’mon,” says a brash voice, startling them apart. Niall bounces up next to them, the bottom of his face hidden by a large scarf. “Shall we?”

He bounds ahead like a golden retriever, saying hello to anyone who passes. Louis and Harry follow behind him, a little more sedate.

“What were you going to say?” Harry asks after a few minutes of walking. “Back there, I mean.”

“Oh, well,” Louis replies. “I was going to say… that’s an even hundred for me, I think.”

Harry hums. One hundred. Two weeks in, and they’re a tenth of the way there.

Almost seems like it’s moving too fast.

_96 - 100._

_______________

_December_

Liam waits all of five seconds after Harry gets his second morning kiss from Louis and Louis walks out the door before it explodes out of him.

“Are we really doing this, then?” he asks, slamming his hand on the table. Niall jumps, his coffee mug rattling as he knee bashes the underside of the table, and Harry stops his fork halfway to his mouth, the syrup from his waffles splashing slowly back onto his plate.

“Jesus, Payno,” Niall mutters.

“Doing what?” Harry asks, bewildered.

 _“This,”_ Liam hisses, waving his hand vaguely in a way that explains nothing at all. “I thought it would be done by now, man. I thought you two would give up.”

“Give up on _what?”_ Harry asks, still baffled.

“This- this stupid- this kissing bet!” Liam finally gets out. His cheeks are all red because he hates confrontation, and normally Harry would pity him, but, well. He also normally understands why there’s confrontation in the first place, too, and he’s definitely missing out on that information right now.  

“Of course it’s not done,” Harry answers carefully. “We said in the beginning, this is, like, a months-long thing. Probably won’t be finished until February or so.”

“No, that’s not-” Liam breaks off with a growl. “Niall, help me out.”

Niall stops trying to rub the new coffee stain off his jeans and clears his throat. “What Liam is oh-so-eloquently trying to say is that we thought all this would dwindle off, not turn casual kissing into a part of your everyday life.”

“Yes,” Liam chimes in. “That. Exactly.”

Harry frowns. “I don’t… understand. Why does that make you upset?”

“Because we love you, man!” Liam cries, throwing his hands up in frustration. “And we love Louis, and there’s no way this can continue and end well. Not with all the- well. You know.”

“No,” Harry says. He carefully sets his fork aside, the bit of waffle still stuck on the end, and folds his hands together. “I _don’t_ know, so please explain.”

“It’s the… the…”

“The unrequited love thing,” Niall finishes, still rubbing a napkin against his thigh.

Well. That- what?

That’s… that’s not what Harry was expecting. At all. Unrequited love thing…

Like, that one of them is in love with the other? Does that mean Louis is in _love_ with him? And how do Niall and Liam know?

“What?” he croaks finally.

“Haz, come on,” Liam says, leveling him a _look._ “Don’t play dumb, we all know. Come on.”

“Liam, honestly, I have _no_ idea what you’re talking about.”

“Look, Harry,” Niall sighs, finally giving up on the stain and looking up, meeting Harry’s questioning gaze. “We know we haven’t been around since the beginning of you and Louis, but we _have_ known each other almost four years. You can trust us.”

“I’m-” Harry laughs in frustration, combing his fingers through his hair. “I’m at a loss for words, because I quite literally have _no idea what you’re talking about.”_

“H, we _know_ you’ve had a crush on Louis since you were, like, seven!” Niall exclaims.

Harry splutters so hard he starts to cough, his throat burning from the sudden intake of too much air. Liam reaches over and smacks him on the back, which doesn’t do anything to clear his airways, but at least the pain in his back lessens the scratching of his throat.

“I don’t-” Harry chokes out, then shakes his head, restarting. “Okay, at one time I liked Louis as more than a friend. But that was _years_ ago, a decade! Just a kid thing.”

“Harry, you can _talk to us,”_ Liam says earnestly. “We want to help, not just for gossip reasons.”

“There’s nothing to help!” Harry groans. “It was just- when we were younger, when I was maybe ten or so, I was the first person Louis told he was gay. And, like, I didn’t even know that was a _thing,_ you know? But Louis explained what that meant, and, I dunno… it just clicked, yeah? It made sense, suddenly. Why I didn’t feel the urge to do ridiculous things for the girls at school, and I didn’t particularly want to hang out with them, alone or otherwise.”

Niall reaches over and pats Harry’s hand, though it’s not like these are bad memories; Harry had his mum and Gemma and a good group of friends, he never really suffered for any of his thoughts or feelings. And, of course, he had Louis, too. Louis was always there.

“I think that’s what did it,” Harry continues. “Thinking about what I’d rather be doing than what all my friends were doing — I didn’t do ridiculous things to impress girls, I did them to impress _Louis._ And I didn’t want to hang out with girls, because the only person I wanted to spend time with was Louis.” Harry chuckles shortly, ruffling his hair again. “This all got mixed up in my head, I guess, because I automatically assumed that since Louis was my best friend and I always wanted to be around him, and he was gay, and I was probably gay… well, that must have meant I loved him, right?”

Liam nods. “Right.”

“But that’s not how it works,” Harry waves his hand. “That’s not love, that’s… I dunno. Infatuation and fascination, I think. Louis always amazed me, so it’s no surprise my little ten-year-old mind got the wires crossed and thought that meant love.”

“But, mate-” Niall tries, and Harry shakes his head.

“No,” he interrupts gently. “You two have built this into something bigger than it is, when I promise it’s not. I didn’t love Louis then, not as anything more than a very best friend, and I don’t love him now. This bet won’t ruin anything because there’s nothing _there_ to ruin.”

“Harry,” Liam trails off. His face is sad, and Harry can’t figure out why. It’s the absolute truth, every word; despite what these two and Louis and Harry’s families and all their childhood friends and all their uni friends and random strangers on the street all think, there’s never been anything romantic between them. In fact, the kissing from this bet is probably the closest they’ve ever come to that, and these kisses are perfunctory at best, fleeting and emotionless at worst.

“Still,” Niall says, and Harry gets the sense he’s tiptoeing, like he’s trying to be tactful. “Must be weird, right? That you had a childhood… thing, for lack of a better word, for Louis, and then your first kiss with him was forced out of a drunk bet? That’s gotta feel weird.”

“Well,” Harry shrugs, giving up on his breakfast and stacking the half-empty plates in front of him, standing and carrying them carefully to the sink. He turns the water on so it’ll heat up, keeping his back to Liam and Niall at the table. “I guess it’s not weird because it _wasn’t_ our first kiss.”

“Um…” Harry hears from Liam. “What.”

“Yeah, no,” Harry says idly, reaching for the dish soap. “We kissed for the first time when I was eleven, then again when I was, I dunno, thirteen or so? Then fifteen, then eighteen. So that wasn’t our first kiss.”

“Harry,” Niall says weakly. “What the hell.”

“Yeah,” Harry continues, scrubbing at an insistent spot on one of the plates. “Technically, though, he was _my_ first kiss.”

In the space of two seconds, the wet plate is removed from Harry’s hands, the faucet is turned off, and he’s manhandled back into his chair at the table. Liam is staring at him, wide-eyed, and Niall looks like he’s about to vibrate right out of his chair.

“Try again,” he says insistently. “Start over, and tell us the whole story.”

“And _don’t_ leave anything out.”

Harry rolls his eyes, wonders what it is about his friends that make them so overdramatic, and starts talking.

_152 - 145._

_______________

“Hey,” Harry says much later, when the sun has set and he and Louis have finished their classes for the day. They’re ambling along an empty street, watching winter moonlight glance off of darkened windows and parked cars, in search of coffee and respite from the flat for a few fucking minutes.

Well, the last one is more for Harry’s sanity than Louis’; if he had to catch Niall or Liam staring at him _one more time_ after telling his and Louis’ real first kiss story, he’d combust.

“Hey,” Louis echoes when Harry never continues his thought. He bumps his hand against Harry’s.

“I was talking to Liam and Niall today,” Harry says, finally finishing the sentence he'd started. “About our first kiss. Not for the bet, the real one, back when we were kids.”

Louis hums, eyebrows quirked. “The one when you were fifteen?”

“No, not that one,” Harry says. “Earlier than that.”

“Oh, when you were thirteen, right.”

“No,” Harry repeats, frowning. “The very first one.” Louis stays quiet, staring out across the street in front of them. “When I was eleven?” Still nothing, and the silence is sheepish now. _“Louis._ Do you not remember my first kiss? You were there!”

Louis breaks, laughing before sending Harry a sly smile. “Yeah, I remember. How could I forget?”

“Ah, you dick,” Harry chuckles. “You had me going.”

“Always, m’dear. Anyway, why were you discussing our previous indiscretions with Things One and Two?”

“They were curious,” Harry shrugs. A chill wind sweeps up behind them, and Harry shivers and tucks his arm through the crook of Louis’ elbow, huddling closer. He chooses his next words carefully, like picking chocolate out of an assortment box. “They seem to think… they seem to think that our little bet is going to make things. I dunno. Awkward, or something.”

“Why would it be awkward?”

“I dunno,” Harry repeats. “They were under the impression we had, like, feelings for each other when we were younger.”

Louis is quiet for a moment, and then all he says is, “Huh. Weird.”  

“Yeah, I told them I didn't have feelings for you either, but they insisted.” Harry grins ruefully, tucking his chin down into his scarf and away from the icy fingers of the wind swirling around them. “They were so sure it had to mean something, since you were my first kiss, but I told them it didn't.”

Louis hums, and then they round the corner and scurry inside the dingy little coffee place they frequent. The holiday decorations are listless, only half the lights on the tree in the corner actually working, and Mariah Carey's vocals pitchy and crackly through the speakers in the ceiling. There's an open couch by the window, though, and that's where Harry and Louis tuck themselves away with their coffees, mugs warming their hands and steam brushing their faces.

“It was mine, too,” Louis says suddenly. His brows are furrowed in thought, mouth pursed.

“Your what?”

“My first kiss,” he replies, still thoughtful. “That one with you when I was thirteen and you were eleven.”

Harry's mouth drops open. “But you said Jason Sambora-”

“Nah, I kissed him after you,” Louis says. “You were my first.”

“And second and third,” Harry jokes, thinking of the innocent first press of lips. Soft and sweet, chapped boy lips barely brushing, tasting like tea and nerves; and then Louis, his voice higher and softer back then but no less mischievous, saying _wait, let's try-_ and Harry's mouth was taken, ownership promptly wrenched away from him. He'd clung to Louis as they'd traded kiss after kiss, exploring the way a mouth can feel against another, the way lips can do so much more than advertised.

“Yeah, true,” Louis grins. “You were definitely my first several kisses.”

“And then,” Harry giggles, thinking forward a little, “a couple years later we had to try it again because we found out tongues were involved and we didn't know how.”

“Figured it out pretty quickly, though, didn't we?”

“And when I was fifteen, too, we kissed then as well. I don't remember why, though.”

“Drunk, I think. Both of us.”

“Oh, right. And when I was eighteen, when I got my-”

“Your uni acceptance, yeah. Christ, I’d forgotten.”

“And now…”

“Now,” Louis agrees, the word sliding out on a soft laugh. “Now we do it daily.”

“Yeah, but it doesn't mean anything,” Harry says idly, sipping at his coffee. “I mean, it's just for the bet.”

“Oh, yeah, of course,” Louis agrees. “Still. Imagine explaining this to your ten-year-old self.”

Harry laughs, and leans back, his arm falling automatically around Louis’ shoulders. He presses a kiss to the crown of Louis’ head, and for the first time in a month he doesn't have a number in his head; the bet will resume tomorrow. This one, this one's just for him.

_152 - 145._

_______________

Harry spots an opportunity to get back at Louis for making Mrs Bagman at the grocer’s believe that they’re madly in love — and, in her opinion, the “most scrumptious things since David and Jonathan” which, while flattering, did nothing to convince Harry she _isn’t_ four hundred thousand years old — and he plans to take it.

It’s week five of their bet, mid-December, and frigid winter wind whips at Harry as he jogs up the three stairs to the front door of the flat. He fumbles his keys but gets the door open eventually, hanging his backpack up on the hook inside the doorway, and kicking muddy slush off his boots. He’s got twenty minutes to grab his apron and get to the grocery shop before he’s late for work, and he’s not thinking about anything but what might possibly be in the fridge that he could take with him as a mid-shift snack when he hears Ed’s distinctive laugh from deeper in the flat.

Harry, who doesn’t consider himself particularly devious, immediately throws himself as silently as possible up against the wall right next to the doorway to the living room. He summons all the stealthiness in his body and peeks, quickly as possible, around the corner.

Oh, this is perfect. Absolutely perfect. Louis is surrounded by people that Harry is absolutely sure don’t know about the bet — Louis won’t tell a soul until a winner is decided, Harry would swear that on his life; if Louis loses, he’ll pretend it never happened and none of their friends outside of Niall and Liam will be the wiser, and if he wins, he’ll tell absolutely everyone he’s ever met and then shrug it off as _not a big deal, winning bets against Harry is basically a daily thing, whatever_ — and he’s even sitting right in the middle of the crowd. Liam, Perrie, Ed, Louis’ friends Jade and Steve, and a couple more familiar faces ring the room, most of them holding either instruments or cigarettes. Perrie sings a line from that 4 Non Blondes song and Steve taps the accompanying rhythm on the coffee table. Conversation and music twine around each other, and this is all so perfect Harry couldn’t have planned it better if he tried.

Except-

“Mate, what’re you-” Niall says from next to Harry, making him jump in surprise. Harry smacks a hand over Niall’s mouth, then listens for the conversation out in the room to falter; when it doesn’t, he sags in relief and pats Niall’s face before dropping his hand again. Niall’s eyebrows are raised in baffled question. “Uh. What was that?”

“I’m paying Louis back for what he did at the grocer’s,” Harry whispers.

A delighted grin crashes across Niall’s face. “Oh, with your cryptkeeper customer? Does she still think you two are the real deal?”

“Yes, and she’s coming to the shop more often now hoping she’ll see us together again,” Harry says. Niall laughs, his face going red as he tries to keep himself quiet, and Harry hisses. “She’s bringing _friends,_ Niall! Like it's a show!”

“Oh my god, that’s hilarious,” Niall says, wiping a tear from under his eye. “Okay. Do you need me to do anything?”

“Just go in there and don’t be suspicious,” Harry says, shooing Niall away. “And don’t help Louis out when he’s trying to explain his way out of this.”

Niall salutes, then heads back into the living room. Harry checks his watch — still has eighteen minutes to get to the grocery shop, and it’ll be worth having to jog to work if this goes as planned — takes a breath, forces the excited grin off his face, and enters the living room.

There’s so much excitement and movement that no one even notices, at first (except for Niall, who’s staring at Harry with an expression of badly-hidden glee, and who is definitely not invited to know any more of Harry’s secret plans ever again); but then Harry’s movement must catch Louis’ eye, because he calls, “Hazza, hey, what’s-”

Harry cuts him off by crawling into his lap and pressing their mouths together.

“Mmph!” Louis says against Harry’s lips, his arms flailing in surprise. They’ve spent the last nearly month and a half avoiding each other's mouths, kissing only in places that, if pressed, they could insist were platonic safe zones — cheeks, foreheads, hands, shoulders. Even Louis’ favorite spot, the inside of Harry’s wrist, feels like it's on a tightrope between okay and a little too much; this kiss flings Harry off the tightrope completely, sending him hurtling toward the safety net below. Their mouths stay shut, no tongues or anything more advanced involved, but the insistent pressure is still visceral enough to make Harry shiver, his shoulders and back rolling instinctively just by being in this position, Louis’ thighs warm underneath him, Harry’s hands firm against Louis’ jaw.

“Uh?” Ed says, but no one else says a word. Harry can hear Liam’s exasperated sigh, though, and so he figures he’s done what he came to do: steal some attention and leave Louis in a hard-to-explain spot.

Louis isn’t flailing anymore, his hands gripping at Harry’s elbows, and Harry figures that’s done and dusted, and now he can land the dismount and swing his hips as he walks away. He decides to throw a couple of cherries on top of this fantastic situation by pressing a line of quick, intimate kisses down Louis’ throat. Before he stands back up, he puts his mouth to Louis’ ear and whispers, quiet enough that no one can hear, “That’s 281 for me, love. Better catch up.”

With that, and feeling like the widow in a noir film walking away from the detective she just duped into thinking she _didn’t_ murder her husband, Harry slides gracefully to his feet, winks at Louis, and leaves the room, pretending he can’t see the shock on every face he leaves behind.

He almost wants to just go, to assume that Louis bluffed and wriggled his way out of this but in a way that let everyone know that the bet is a _thing,_ and it's a _thing_ Harry's going to _win_ and when all these people ask Louis about it he’ll have to _tell_ them that Harry won.

But he’s not going to do that. The larger, pettier side of him isn’t going to let this opportunity slip by, and he lingers outside the room as the shocked silence fades into muffled giggles.

“Erm, Lou?” Perrie asks. “Got anything to tell us?”

Instead of shooting off something smart, like Harry'd expected, Louis stays silent. The giggles, if possible, grow even more pronounced.

And that is _fantastic._

Honestly, Louis’ excuses would've been hilarious to hear, but complete shocked silence is even better.

“What's the matter, Tommo?” Niall asks. “Harry got your tongue?”

Harry claps his hand over his mouth to stifle his giggle; okay, maybe Niall redeemed his terrible secret-keeping skills with that one.

“I… I-” Louis finally says. “I didn't dream that, did I? That actually happened?”

“I don’t know, you could probably convince me that was a mass hallucination,” Jade says.

“It wasn’t,” Liam says dully. “Unless I’ve been hallucinating for a month now.”

“A _month?!”_ Perrie shrieks.

  


Harry is fifteen minutes late for work, and when he apologises his boss just rolls his eyes. Apparently, the cheek-cramping grin on Harry’s face isn’t really conducive to convincing anyone he’s actually sorry.

Ah, well. Worth it.

_281 - 275._

_______________

Slowly, as if the kisses becoming routine wasn’t enough, they come to take the place of _thank you._ And Harry, if he’s being honest, doesn’t really know how that happened.

All he knows is that one day, he asks Louis to pass him the salt, and instead of saying “Thanks,” he leans over and presses a kiss to Louis’ hairline.

And then later, Louis is trying to text and walk at the same time and almost runs into a light pole before Harry diverts him at the last minute. He grabs Harry’s hand and kisses his wrist, making Harry’s hand spasm from the gentle touch.

They don’t talk about it, but that’s okay.

It keeps happening anyway.

_298 - 301_

_______________

On the final Friday before Christmas, Harry, Louis, Niall, and Liam throw a party.

The usual suspects are all there, and they’ve all brought friends. The flat is full to bursting, and Harry’s just glad they packed away anything remotely valuable because he’d never know if something wasn’t where it was supposed to be until it was far too late. Louis has replaced all their lights with red and green bulbs, and Niall invited his friend with the really expensive sound system so he can blast his terrible Christmas carol remixes. There’s so much alcohol that Harry actually hides some of it in his room, worried that ten bottles of vodka for a fifty-person party might be too much. Clumps of bodies are melded together around the room, conversations not held so much as thrown, the temperature in the room peaking even as winter watches from outside.

It’s about one o’clock now, and Harry’s sloshy with liquor, filled to the brim. He’s danced and ate and danced some more, had (probably) amazing conversations he can’t remember with people he hasn’t seen since last year’s party. He’s done a round of shots with Niall, with Liam, and with Nick and that wild group. He kissed someone under the mistletoe, but he can’t remember who or if it was any good.

Oh, shit. That goes against the rules, doesn’t it? The kissing bet rules? Harry’s brain is mostly running on fumes at the moment, but he’s pretty sure he remembers that.

He stumbles to the kitchen, feet tangling around each other as he tries to find- ah, there they are. The faded napkins with the bet rules are still hanging, as well as their score sheets, almost full of scribbled tally marks by now. Harry frowns at that; they’ll have to remember to grab more napkins next time they go to the pub

Harry reads over the rules, eyes squinted as he tries to make sense of his own terrible handwriting. Then he sees it, _IF HARRY OR LOUIS KISSES SOMEONE WHO ISn’T PART OF THE BET THEY HAVE TO TELL THE OTHER ONE_.

Well. Right then. Guess he’d better go find-

“Louis!” Harry gasps as something small but dense rocks into his side. Louis is festooned in tinsel, glittery gold wrapped around his head like a halo, but somehow his grin is still the brightest thing on him, even outshining the red glowing nose of the reindeer on his jumper.

“Hazza!” he shouts. “Christmas!”

“Yeah, it is,” Harry agrees. He grabs Louis’ wrists to hold him still. “Liss’n, I ‘ve to tell you something.”

Louis’ eyes go wide. “What?”

“I,” Harry says, placing a hand over his heart to show he's really, really sorry, “kissed someone else under th’ mistletoe.”

Louis stares at him for a second, eyes wide and reflective, throwing the party back at Harry as he watches him for a reaction. Then he turns, just as slowly, to the napkins on the wall, reads for a long few seconds, then gasps.

“You broke a rule,” he accuses.

“I know!” Harry wails, grabbing Louis’ wrists again. “I'm sorry, I’m s’sorry.”

“S’okay,” Louis says, and Harry stops his wailing.

“Really?”

“Yeah. ‘sides, I kissed someone under it too.”

“Oh,” Harry says, frowning. “You did? Who? Who’d you kiss?”

“Who,” Louis repeats, laughing. He taps Harry's nose, and says, “Little owl. Who, who.”

“Louiiiis,” Harry complains. “Who wassit?”

“I dunno,” Louis shrugs.

“Oh,” Harry says again. Then, “Was it me?”

Louis stares at him for a long time again, but this time his eyes are narrowed like he's reading Harry's bones through his skin. Harry lets him look, because he doesn’t really have another option. Walk away? Not likely. “No…” Louis says finally. “No, it wasn't you.”

“How d’you know?” Harry's sure that Louis’ had more to drink than him, because he's got a tolerance like a racehorse, or something else with a really high alcohol tolerance. Either way, if Harry's not had as much to drink as Louis and _he_ can't remember who _he_ snogged in the doorway to the living room, he doubts Louis knows either.

But Louis just says, “It didn't feel like you,” the words said simply, laid out in front of Harry matter-of-factly.

Harry's about to say _oh_ for the third time, this time taken from his mouth by surprise. He's about to say that he's sad that it _wasn't_ Louis that he kissed, because they've had over three hundred of those now and each one is different but also the same, like coming home to find everything moved slightly to the left, and discovering that you like it better that way anyway. And after that maybe he'll say that the strand of green twinkle lights overhead make Louis’ eyes look like oceans, and that he smells like peppermint and all Harry's best childhood memories.

He says, “Oh,” and he's about to say all that or maybe something else, some of the other words caught in the stalagmites of his chest. He's about to say that maybe Niall and Liam were right, and this bet did change everything but he can't point towards a single demonstrative thing that is different, except maybe that way Louis looks like how coming home feels. He’s going to say that starlight burns hot in his chest now and it flares when Louis touches him, but then a not-Louis hand yanks on his arm.

“Harry!” a not-Louis voice exclaims, a girl voice, a familiar girl voice, an Alexa-friend-of-Nick’s voice. The party rushes back to hit Harry in increments; green and red and gold and silver, a Christmas tree dressed in its finest in the corner, a floor that shakes from bass and booze under his feet. “Harry,” not-Louis Alexa says again, her red mouth widening. “Niall” — not-Louis Niall, Harry's drink-drowned brain supplies — “found the microphone for karaoke, we _have_ to do a song!”

These words mean something in Harry's mind but they don't compete with his hands, wrapped around Louis’ wrists, or the jumbled thoughts in his head that were just seconds ago saying the same thing, _kiss him kiss him kiss him._

“I don't know the words,” he mumbles.

Alexa (not-Louis Alexa) laughs. “To what?”

“To anything.”

“Do Mariah Carey,” a Louis voice says beside him, the voice attached to the wrists held in Harry’s hands. Harry pivots, finds a Louis pair of eyes there too. “Muscle mem’ry alone c’ld get you through that one.”

“Okay,” Harry says, and then Alexa (not-Louis Alexa) is dragging him through the crowd to where Niall (not-Louis Niall) is taking the microphone back from an enthusiastic Liam (not-Louis Liam), who’s begging to do _just one more, Ni, c’mon, man._

“No,” Niall says, shooing Liam away. He turns to the newcomers, brandishing the mic Liam’s still trying to steal back. “It’s Harry and Alexa’s turn!”

There’s a wobbly, drunken cheer from the onlookers, and Niall sorts through his music library to find the song. Somehow, Louis was right: Harry hears the first chord and drops his voice to sing, the first stretched _I-I-I_ tumbling out with no thought of his own.

It helps that everyone else is as drunk, if not more so, than Harry is; when he starts singing at the wrong time or does the lyrics to _Last Christmas_ instead of the song that’s actually playing, they don’t even seem to notice. Harry doesn’t even sing into the microphone for half the song, too busy dancing to stay close to Alexa and the mic. He forgets that he sang the first half of the song before he ever even gets to the second chorus.

But there’s something that snaps him back into his body with about thirty seconds left in the metaphorical limelight, and that something is watching from the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, eyes glittering in the dark. Harry’s focus shifts back to where it was, where it belongs, away from the not-Louises around him and onto the real thing.

 _“All I want for Christmas is… youuuu,”_ Harry belts, hitting somewhere near the high notes. A little grin appears at the corner of Louis’ mouth, tucked away but still present, and Harry’s stomach flips like he’s missed a step going down the stairs.

The jingle bells on the track are still ringing when Harry leaves Alexa with the mic, improvising her own ending to the song. He pushes his way through the unsteady, easily distracted crowd, bounces off of people’s shoulders, and then.

And then he’s there, with Louis, standing in the doorway to the kitchen. Louis is bigger up close, filling Harry’s senses in a way he thought only water and good weed could do.

They don’t say anything; maybe they’re too drunk for that, or maybe they’re not drunk enough. They just look at each other, in a way they don’t do so much anymore because they’re so used to the shape the other takes in the room. Harry looks, and he sees; sees blue and brown and a terrible Christmas jumper, sees eye crinkles softened by long eyelashes, lips too thin to be beautiful but no other word fits them as well. He sees his best friend, and the half of his soul where all the wit and wonder lives.

Louis smiles, slow and syrup sweet, and points up. “Oops,” he says. Harry looks up as well, and nearly gets mistletoe in his eye.

Mistletoe.

Right.

Louis grabs the front of Harry's shirt and pulls him down, their lips connecting.

Immediately, this kiss is different. This isn’t bet-driven kisses on the cheek and forehead, this isn’t the over-the-top-for-the-sake-of-drama kiss Harry gave Louis in front of all their friends. This is immediately different, wildly different, two completely opposite species of kisses.

Louis threads a hand through Harry's hair and tugs, coaxing his mouth open. Harry lets him; he wants to be taken apart, wants to swallow Louis whole; his mouth tastes like beer and melted sapphires, like heat and light and Christmas.

Harry feels a hard line against his back and realises vaguely that Louis has backed him up against the doorframe, pressing into his space. He's got his arms around Harry's neck and there's no air between them, Harry's heart pounding against his ribs and Louis’ echoing the beat. Breaths are little more than ragged exhales and fleeting inhales, an unending circle caused by the need for their lips to stay connected winning out over the need to breathe.

This isn't drunk party kissing; this is something Harry's not sure he's ever experienced. This is gripping hands and heat and gasping, but it’s also sweet sweeps of tongue and gentle bites to lower lips. And it's definitely not something he's ever had with anyone who has known him through the most important moments of his life, with anyone who’s been by his side since he was a wild-curled preteen.

Which makes sense; the only person that could be is Louis, and he’s never kissed Louis like this before.

It doesn't _feel_ like Louis tracing his tongue against Harry's teeth, but at the same time, it doesn't feel like a kiss that could come from anyone else.

Louis shifts just a little and Harry gasps, their hips aligning in a way that chases anything but _yes, now, yes_ out of his mind. Their mouths connect and disconnect, slow slides of wet lips, little noises let out into the night.

“Lou,” Harry murmurs thickly in the split second between kisses. Louis doesn't answer, other than angling his head a different way and wrecking Harry from a new direction.

Nearby, someone splits the general mayhem around them with a yell. “Ten! Nine! Eight!” the voice shouts, and then someone else is yelling back, “It's not New Years, Liam! And it's not even midnight!”

The sudden awareness of something outside of Louis’ mouth is like a rush of adrenaline, making Harry wrench himself back just the slightest bit, not so far that the heat from Louis’ flushed face doesn't hit him like a sun lamp.

“So,” Louis says breathlessly, “does that only count as one?”

Harry chuckles, and leans forward to rest his head on Louis’ shoulder. The world still spins, helped along by good music and cheap liquor, but Harry feels like it's all a bit new, now. The old Earth is turning but he's a new person on it, unsteady where he stands.

“I dunno,” he answers. “Call it an even ten?”

Louis laughs too, and Harry hopes it's still as funny in the morning.

_392 - 392._

_______________

Harry and Louis take the train back home to Manchester the next morning, heads heavy and stomachs rolling just enough to make their commute silent. They haven't talked about it, probably won't, if their history is anything to go by. Harry doesn't know what it would even solve, anyway, this talking lark.

_Hey, mate, we got a bit smashed and sucked each other’s faces, which is sort of not out of the ordinary, what with being in the middle of an incredibly mature kissing bet. Still friends?_

But Harry can't just leave it, he can't. He digs the breakfast sandwich he packed for Louis out of his bag and passes it over, nodding at Louis’ grunt of thanks.

“Hey, Lou,” Harry says, picking at his own sandwich. “You're still… you're still okay with this, right?”

Louis levels him with a look that Harry can't really read. “Wif’ wha’?” he asks through a mouthful of food.

“You know.” Harry picks at his breakfast. “The bet.”

Louis swallows his bite and chews off another. Last night lingers in the bruises under his eyes, the slightly rigid way he moves. Harry wonders if he tastes the same as he did last night. Wonders if he shouldn't be wondering that.

“Yeah,” Louis says finally. “I'm okay.”

“You want to keep going, then?” Harry presses.

The first spark of humor hits Louis, his eyes brightening even as Harry watches. “Can't convince me to forfeit that easily, Styles,” he grins. “Besides, we’re tied again, aren't we? Even start.”

“Guess so,” Harry replies, nudging at Louis’ shoulder with his own. “Okay. Cool.”

When the train pulls into the station Harry and Louis go their separate ways to their own houses. They'll only have a few days apart, because the Styles family always ends up at the Tomlinson-Deakin Christmas party every year without fail, but they still hesitate before they go.

“Bye, Curly,” Louis says quietly, then pauses just momentarily before leaning up on his tiptoes and kissing Harry's cheek. The childhood nickname fits Harry better here than it ever did anywhere else, sliding onto him like a forgotten second skin. Harry wonders if his old self, the chubby-cheeked kid who left here to join his best friend at university and never looked back, will still fit him over the new addition of three hundred Louis Tomlinson kisses.

 _Curly,_ Louis says, and it does, it fits. They’re still Louis and Harry, they’re still partners in crime, a matched set. Kissing can’t change that, Harry realizes.

And with that, Harry decides to return the favor.

“Bye, Boo,” he grins easily, kissing Louis back to keep it even. His cheek is hot under Harry’s lips, and Harry assumes it’s the hangover.

He doesn’t almost lean down and give Louis another one on the lips. He doesn’t. He won’t.

_393 - 393._

_______________

The Tomlinson-Deakin Christmas party is what Harry and Louis’ flat party will evolve into someday, if they’re lucky. It’s just as loud, just as jam-packed and boisterous. There’s just as much alcohol, but it’s held in fancy bottles and long-stemmed glasses, topped with olives or twists or cherries or sugared rims. There’s mistletoe here, too, and Harry neatly avoids the largest bunch of it over the front door, sliding out of his coat and shaking the snow from his hair.

He heads upstairs as soon as he makes it past the welcoming committee, Louis’ almost-youngest twin sisters clinging to Harry’s legs as he tries to walk forward. Lottie is there to pull them away, but she tells Harry not to disappear because she wants to talk haircare when they have a second of peace.

Louis’ room upstairs is locked, but Harry’s known how to pick the worn tumbler since he was thirteen and he and Louis went through a James Bond phase. There’s even an unfolded paper clip still resting in the dust on the top of the doorframe, and Harry jimmies the door open with little effort. He snorts when he sees the chaos erupting out of Louis’ suitcase, his damage already done and the room already a mess even though he’s only been home for a few days.

Harry tosses his coat on top of the unmade bed and unwinds his scarf, leaving that there as well. He stoops to look in the mirror near Louis’ wardrobe, swiping his hand through his hair and tugging the curls brushing his shoulders.

“Are you all pretty now?” asks a voice from the doorway.

“Almost,” Harry answers primly, combing his hair back once more before turning to face Louis, who is leaned up against his open bedroom door, his expression shadowed by the backlight from the hallway.

“Ah, yes, you were hideous before,” Louis agrees, and Harry sticks out his tongue. Louis laughs, then angles his head. “C’mon, they’re about to run out of the mint for those mojitos you like, figured you’d want at least one.”

“Ah, yes, I do want one,” Harry agrees. Louis’ stepdad Dan’s mojitos are legendary, and deadly. It’s not a real Tomlinson-Deakin Christmas party if Harry doesn’t have at least one of those. He stops in front of Louis, who hasn’t moved, still casual against the worn wood of his door. “Happy Christmas, Lou.”

He leans down and presses a kiss to Louis’ cheek, this one another one of those long, lingering types that Harry can’t seem to stop himself from giving Louis when he stands still for more than a few seconds.

“Happy Christmas, Haz,” Louis murmurs when Harry pulls back. That makes Harry pause, still caught in Louis’ orbit; Louis’ hand brushes Harry’s stomach through his thin shirt and he shivers.

_“Ahem.”_

Harry squeezes his eyes shut and grimaces just for a moment, making Louis chuckle quietly. He opens his eyes again and stares up at the ceiling, begging for his sister to have missed what just happened. “Yeah, Gem?”

“Mum wants you to help carry in the food we brought,” Gemma says. When Harry turns, her eyebrows are raised so high they nearly disappear under her fringe.

“Be there in a second.”

“Sure,” Gemma says, but she doesn’t move. Harry looks up, meets Louis’ eyes, and tries to send him a silent _I’m sorry-this is going to be terrible-I’ll find you later_ message. Louis just grins and shakes his head.

Gemma stays quiet until the moment they step outside, and then she’s squealing and beating Harry’s arm with two enthusiastic hands. “You and Louis!” she exclaims, eyes wide. “It’s finally happening! _You and Louis!”_

“Nothing is happening, Gem,” Harry groans. He opens the boot of his mum’s car and grabs a casserole dish, passing it to Gemma, then grabs the last two pies as well. “You’re blowing it out of proportion.”

“I’m doing no such thing, this is _huge,”_ Gemma says. “We’ve been waiting for you two to get your shit together, and here you are, on Christmas-”

“Wait, who’s ‘we’?”

“-and you’ve actually done it! I’m proud, baby brother, I won’t lie.”

“It was a Christmas kiss!” Harry argues, and it’s weak but also _true._ “We aren’t, like, secretly shagging or something.”

“Oh, don’t get all weird now that I know,” Gemma says, opening the door to the house and leading the way to the kitchen. “I can keep a secret.”

“A secret about what?” Lottie asks, popping up next to Harry and taking the pies from his arms, setting them in the empty spaces on the kitchen table.

“Louis and Harry have finally got together!” Gemma announces.

Lottie’s eyes go wide and Harry hisses, waving his arms before clapping his palms over both of their mouths. “Shut up,” he whispers. “No, no, we’re not doing this here. Shut up shut up shut up- if anyone asks me about this, I’ll destroy everything you love,” he warns.

Gemma makes a locking motion in front of her mouth and tosses away the key, but the look she exchanges with Lottie is not very promising.

“I’m gonna-” Harry sighs, thumbing over his shoulder at the rest of the party still going strong in the living room. He turns at the last minute and points at Gemma and Lottie, brows scrunched to show he’s serious. “Don’t say a _word.”_

Lottie crosses her heart, and Harry still really doesn’t believe her.

“Dan,” Harry groans when he makes it to the makeshift bar setup. “The only thing that could save tonight is one of your magic mojitos.”

Dan grins sympathetically. “Sorry, H, fresh out. I can do something else for you though?”

Harry lets his head thump against the tabletop in despair.

He spends the next few hours sipping second-rate gin and avoiding everyone and everything: Gemma and Lottie giggling and whispering in the corner, Louis who is making faces at him across the room as he talks to Dan’s boring business partners (and who Harry _really_ wants to go talk to except he knows it would set their sisters off again), and the mistletoe still waiting for unwary passerby overhead.

At the end of the night, though, Harry’s family is the last to leave, and and he and Louis grab a bin bag and head far in the opposite direction of everyone else to get a moment’s peace together.

“So, Gemma knows, then,” Louis says as they collect used napkins and plates from the odd places people set them when they were finished. Harry’s got handfuls of empty champagne glasses, the glass tinkling as they click together.

“Yeah. I mean, I didn’t tell her, like. The bet part.”

Louis hums, sending Harry a mischievous look. “You know, this wouldn’t have happened at all if you could keep your lips to yourself.”

Harry gasps in affront. “Me? You’re the one who stopped me from moving away! Besides, I was just trying to pull ahead since we were still tied.”

“Ah,” Louis says. “Mhm. Right. I believe you.”

“No you don’t,” Harry grumbles, throwing a balled-up napkin at Louis. He stands up straight, head cocked to the side.

“Oh, is that what we’re doing?” he asks, reaching inside the bag for another napkin to throw back.

“Oh yeah,” Harry says, widening his stance.

When Gemma comes looking for them, Harry’s covered in clotted cream and spinach dip, pinned under Louis and holding his wrists away from his face as Louis tries to smear his face with leftover cake, laughing loudly.

“For god’s sake,” Harry huffs as Gemma raises her eyebrows again. “You always come at the worst times.”

“That’s what she said,” Louis grins, and the grin widens when Harry groans. He hops off of Harry’s hips and holds out a hand to help him up. “Now go on, Haz, you’re a mess.”

“Your fault,” Harry points out, and Louis just winks.

“See you on New Years,” Louis says.

“394 to 393,” Harry says in answer.

Louis snags a hand around his wrist and pulls him back before Harry knows what’s happening, his world spinning before Louis stills him, hands on his cheeks. This kiss is different than the one at their own party, or the one where Harry was in his lap, or the awkward brush of lips almost two months ago that kicked this whole thing off. Someday, Harry will asks how he does that; how Louis takes a simple act and changes the meaning so that it feels different than the ones before. This one is playful and short, like a quipped joke; the one at their party was heated and serious, a duet.

Harry’s hands catch in Louis’ jacket lapels, curling around the soft suede fabric. Their mouths move like a conversation, words only they can hear; Louis’ lips are warm and bitten from a night trying not to laugh at Harry across a crowded room. Harry soothes the bites now with his tongue, little ridges gone soft from Harry’s ministrations.

“394 to 394,” Louis corrects breathlessly when they break apart. “We’ve still got a long way to go.”

Harry laughs softly, leans his forehead against Louis’. “Yeah,” he agrees, “we do.”

Harry doesn’t even try to explain to Gemma what just happened. She wouldn’t believe him anyway.

_394 - 394._

_______________

_January_

“Happy new year!” goes the cheer. Niall’s terrible _Auld Lang Syne_ remix blasts in the background; 12:00 precisely, and it’s the start of something new.

This is where Harry should be kissing someone he’s only known for a couple of hours, someone pretty with a bright smile who makes his stomach flip when their fingers touch. It could be something new too, maybe if the kiss was good Harry would ask for a date, or a phone number; maybe if the kiss wasn’t that memorable they’d stay friends. Either way, a memory made, a New Year celebrated, a firework of lips and smiles fizzing between him and someone bright, sparkling, new.

Instead, he’s kissing Louis.

Not that Louis doesn’t sparkle; Louis _shines,_ Louis is what the moon gets its light from when the sun doesn’t want to do its job. Louis melts the frost off the world, Louis is the burnished gold of old London and the shiny silver of chrome and glass.

And it’s not that Louis isn’t new, because Louis is ever-changing; Louis is the pattern of the stars in the sky night after night, Louis is tie-dyed freedom, reckless waves against a shore, no beat of the drum the same.

It’s just that this kiss is something new but something old, too. It’s twelve years of friendship with a new sharp edge. It’s a glass mirror broken into new shapes, a mosaic of what was and what is and what will continue to change.

It’s Louis at age twelve, he and Harry hidden under Harry’s blankets, letting tears drip down his nose as he explains to Harry that he doesn’t think he’ll ever like a girl _like that._ That the people who make him jittery and jumpy are all boys, that he likes their deeper voices and the way they move like nothing in their path could stop them. It was the way those words hit Harry; _oh,_ and he thinks to himself, _yeah, me too,_ and he thinks _that’s you, that’s what_ you _do._

It’s Louis at thirteen, jaw sharper, grin brighter, and the way he says, “We should try something,” before brushing a bumbling, awkward kiss to Harry’s lips, the first one ever. And then again, when he says, “No, wait, I can do it better,” and that’s exactly what happens. He presses his mouth to Harry’s and something moves, something slides into place, and suddenly everything makes sense.

It’s Louis at sixteen, holding Harry’s hand as he tries not to cry, breath hiccupy in his chest. He tells Louis, “He thought I wouldn’t find out, he thought-” but he can’t finish, because no he didn’t love Michael but he liked him a lot, and they had fun together. It’s Louis saying, “Don’t worry, love, he’ll regret this. I’ll make sure of it.” It’s Louis climbing through Harry’s window at midnight for the next week to check he’s still okay. It’s Louis showing up a few days later with a bag of supplies and a plan to ruin Michael’s life and his car, too.

It’s Louis at seventeen, and his bags are packed and his room is bare of everything that made it his. He and Harry have been passing a bottle of champagne back and forth in pseudo-celebration, neither of them mentioning that it’s less _congratulations_ and more _don’t forget me while we’re apart._ Louis has kissed Harry multiple times by this point, but this is the first time Harry kisses Louis; it’s salty and tastes like tears and goodbye, and they’ll fall asleep wrapped around each other before Louis leaves for uni and new experiences in the morning.

It’s Louis at twenty, showing a wide-eyed Harry all the great spots on campus to study and nap and eat, squeezing his hand with excitement that he’s here, they’re both here, reunited at last.

It’s Louis at twenty-one, telling Harry that Antonio asked him to marry him, but Louis turned him down because he doesn’t feel ready. Later, he’ll add that it didn’t feel right. Later, he’ll say he’s glad Antonio ended it because he didn’t think he loved him after all.

It’s Louis at twenty-two, and their flat is old and cold and the stairs to the bedrooms sound like they’ll fall in if a person doesn’t tiptoe, but Louis thunders up them without fear to fall onto Harry’s bed everyday; he moans about schoolwork and footie practice and _Liam’s started snoring again, Hazza, we’re gonna have to get our own place now._

It’s Louis at twenty-three, and the way his lips are soft but unyielding; firm but supple.

It’s another piece of Harry and Louis, of the tapestry of _them,_ together, two lives that intertwined early on and they never bothered separating.

It’s 12:04 a.m. on January first, and it’s a new year.

_436 - 444._

_______________

 **_Gemma:_ ** Look I get that you’re like ~trying to play it cool, or w/e  
**_Gemma:_ ** I do. I get that.  
**_Gemma:_ ** But eventually you’re going to tell him, right?  
**_Harry:_ ** Gem, it’s four in the morning. Who am I telling what?  
**_Gemma:_ ** You’re going to tell Louis you’re in love with him before this goes too far  
**_Harry:_ ** I’m not in love with him.  
**_Gemma:_ ** You’re not not in love with him  
**_Harry:_ ** It’s too early for this. Goodnight, Gemma.  
**_Gemma:_ ** Just think it over, okay?  
**_Gemma:_ ** _The way you two looked at Christmas, that didn’t seem like two people not in love  
_ Read 4:07 AM

 

 **_Harry:_ ** We aren’t.  
**_Gemma:_ ** _Maybe not. Or maybe you just haven’t realised  
_ Read 8:04 AM

_______________

Two weeks after the winter holiday, Harry, Louis, Liam, and Niall are at the pub. This isn’t the first time they’ve been back since the infamous night the bet began, and it won’t be the last, but somehow they all knew they had to be here for this.

“To five hundred,” Louis says, raising his glass.

“To being halfway through this madness,” Liam adds under his breath.

Harry drinks from his glass, wipes his mouth with the back of his wrist, and leans across the table to land a kiss on Louis’ lips.

“501,” he grins, and Louis grins back.

_501 - 500._

_______________

It all started as a drunken bet.

It escalates during a quiet night in.

They’ve got a few friends over, watching old films they probably already have memorized, handing around flavored bowls of popcorn and chastising Niall when he mixes the toffee corn with the sea salt bowl. There’s no such thing as personal space among friends in their pajamas, and so the living room has become piles of people and blankets, pillows strewn about. There was a bottle of wine at one point, but it’s empty now and Perrie and Leigh’s lips are purple so they’ve resorted to cider and Harry’s favorite schnapps instead.

Harry’s next to Louis, because that’s where he always is. Even before this bet, if Louis took a spot on the couch, he made room for Harry to follow. They switch about every thirty minutes or so — Harry’s head on Louis’ chest and his legs thrown across Ed’s lap; Louis on the floor in front of Harry, his temple laid over on Harry’s knees and Perrie’s head in his own lap; cross-legged under the same blanket, Louis’ head on Harry’s shoulder.

The kisses are flowing tonight, and they don’t get any second (or third or fourth) looks from their friends now that they’re all fully aware of the bet. It’s just another Harry-and-Louis thing, for them; it’s Louis being competitive and Harry as his willing accomplice.

As the credits roll for _Notting Hill,_ Louis yawns and gets to his feet, stretching his arms upward. “Drink?” he asks Harry sleepily, and when Harry shakes his head no, Louis leans down and kisses him before he goes. No one is moving to put another film on: Nick is holding court in the corner, braiding Jesy’s hair and gossiping with Pixie and Alexa. Ed and Niall have their heads bent over Niall’s newest purchase, a Fender 1959 Strat he’s been saving up for. Perrie and Leigh and Liam are playing spin the bottle with the empty wine bottle, except instead of kissing when it lands on someone they just cheer tipsily and spin again.

And so Harry startles when someone sits next to him, and he blinks himself more fully awake to find it’s Louis’ friend Steve, watching Harry easily.

“Hi,” Harry says.

“Hi,” Steve answers. “How long have you been in love with Louis?”

Harry likes Steve, he does. But when he hears what Steve has to ask he just sighs, blowing a curl out of his face. “Why does everyone _think_ that?”

Steve doesn’t answer right away, and Harry supposes he appreciates that. If it was Gemma — who still hasn’t stopped texting him about confessing to Louis that he’s loved him since they met over a decade ago, despite that not being the case at all — she would have already thrown out four excuses for asking and five barbed comments to help supplement her position. Liam and Niall — who, infuriatingly, agree with Gemma — would’ve apologised but sent Harry sad looks across the room for the rest of the night. Nick — who, once he heard about Liam, Niall, and Gemma agreeing on something, demanded to know what they were talking about and then immediately agreed with them as well — wouldn’t have apologized but would’ve probably prodded and pushed until Harry either snapped or answered.

Steve takes a second to think and then says, “You kiss him like you love him.”

Louis chooses that moment to reappear, smiling at Steve and wiggling back into his space next to Harry. He nudges until Harry gets the hint and puts his arm over Louis’ shoulders, so Louis can tuck himself close. Harry kisses his forehead before he even thinks about it, and that’s when the realisation hits.

That’s the moment.

He looks over at Steve, who isn’t making a fuss or drawing attention to what he said coming true right in front of his eyes. “I didn’t know,” he says honestly.

“Know what?” Louis mumbles, eyes on Liam as he chooses another film from the pile they’re working through tonight.

Steve just smiles, and says, “Nothing, bro,” to Louis before patting Harry’s shoulder and leaving him to his thoughts. He feels like he should be panicking; maybe the panic comes later.  

_You kiss him like you love him._

Well, yeah. Maybe he does.

_546 - 549._

_______________

He was right — the panic _does_ set in later.

He’s in love with Louis.

Right. _Right_.

Harry’s never been one for quick judgment. He takes his time. Pro-con lists. He’s taken economics courses, he knows benefits versus losses.  

This is different. This is- this is real life. Those problems in the textbook, supply and demand and what to do if there’s a grapefruit shortage and a satsuma surplus, that’s not _real life._

Well, okay, yeah, it is. But it’s not _Harry’s_ life, and that’s the one he’s concerned about right now.

And the thing is, everyone knew. Everyone knew, and they kept asking him about it but he’d waved them off. It was ridiculous, he’d thought, that two guys — two _childhood best friends_ — couldn’t share a first kiss and also a few more after that and then start a kissing bet and then escalate the kissing bet so that their mouths are now touching on the regular without being assumed to be in love.

Joke’s on him, apparently.

Everyone knew, and yet _no one_ is being helpful.

“Oh, thank god,” Liam had burst out when Harry whispered frantically to them that maybe he wasn’t as not-in-love with Louis as he thought.

“That’s fantastic, mate,” Niall said. “Well done, good catch.”   


Their ecstatic expressions dropped when Harry hissed, “Now what?”

“Now what?” Liam laughs, like Harry’s joking. Like this is a joke. Like this is _funny._ “Now you _tell him.”_

“I will,” Harry says automatically. “Eventually. But, until then, next suggestion.”

“Next sug- next- _what,”_ Liam said faintly. “No, that’s not- no. We’ve been waiting _too long-_ no, I can’t, Niall, _tell him-”_

“H, think about it,” Niall cut in. “We’ve been waiting literal years, since the first day we met you, for one of you to admit that you’re in love, _or_ for one of you to figure out you’re in love and _then_ admit it. You’re panicking, but we’ve thought this through. You have to tell him _now_ . You _have_ to.”

“I can’t tell him _now,”_ Harry whispered furiously.

“Why the hell not?”

“Because.”

“Because _why?”_

“Because it’s scary!” Harry said, throwing his arms up in defeat. “It’s scary and, honestly, I think we could be really good together, and I’m not really worried about ruining our friendship because I think that we could survive anything, but it’s scary that I’ve potentially been in love with him before I even knew what that _meant,_ and I have to have a _moment_ to reconcile that. Can I have that moment? Please?”

Niall blinked in surprise, and Liam pouted his lower lip a little like he does when he’s thinking.

“Okay,” Liam said finally. “For a little while. But we’re not letting this stretch into some decades-long miscommunication nonsense, alright?”

“Alright,” Harry agreed. “Now. Besides telling him, what can I do?”  

They didn’t have any answers for him. Neither did Gemma, or Nick, or Steve. Or Jade or Perrie or Liam and Niall again or Jesy or Mrs Bagman or Alexa or Leigh or Ed.

It’s the words that are the issue. Three little one-syllable words, eight letters total, shouldn’t be so heavy on the tongue, but they are; Harry doesn’t think he’d be able to say them so much as let them tumble out of his mouth and hope they at least land in the right order. And that doesn’t seem right, not for this. Not for them. This is twelve years summed up in three words, this needs Harry’s mouth’s full cooperation. And his mouth won’t cooperate until the words sit right in his mind, too.

He needs time, basically, before the words will come.

And so he needs to tell Louis without words.

Right.

_555 - 551._

_______________

Louis catches a cold on the eleventh week of the bet, his nose red and irritated and his shivery, achey self perpetually surrounded by used tissues and cooling cups of tea. He doesn’t take well to being sick, but Harry takes well to playing nurse, so it balances out.

Plus, it gives him a chance to try that new soup recipe he found ages ago.

“Knock knock,” he says quietly, pushing Louis’ bedroom door open. It’s stifling hot and pitch black inside, the blankets pulled up to Louis’ chin and his face bright red.

“Haz, ‘m dyin’,” he sniffles pitifully.

Harry tuts, placing the tray of soup and tea and biscuits on Louis’ crowded bedside table. “You aren’t dying, Lou, just got a little cold.”

“Dyin’,” Louis repeats huffily, turning his face into the pillow.

“Well,” Harry says, concealing a smile. “I’m sorry to hear that. But until you go, could you try to drink a little of the tea, or eat some soup?”

Louis grumbles, but nods a little. Harry smiles for real this time and leans down, kissing Louis on the forehead, his skin warm and damp against Harry’s lips.

“Doesn’t count,” Louis says.

“What doesn’t?”

“That kiss,” Louis says. “I can’t get you back, or I’ll get you sick. It doesn’t count.”

“What if I just mark us both down for one?”

“No!” Louis rebuts petulantly. “I have to earn it.” He grabs Harry's hand and kisses it, though he still looks grumpy about it. “There. Now I don't get a freebie.”

“I'm so glad our nonsensical bet is being kept fair,” Harry agrees, and even though Louis huffs at that, Harry catches the hint of a smile as Louis reaches out and snags a biscuit off the tray.

_642 - 656._

_______________

Harry taps his finger on his lip, looking up at the wall now dubbed (unofficially) as the Bet Wall. The original napkins are there, the rules tacked up with pushpins as the super glue starts to lose its hold, the two first score napkins filled up with tally marks and scribbles, faded and wrinkled and stained. Next to those are the newer napkins, still sort-of white and only half filled with checks and marks.

Louis is back home for the weekend, watching his youngest siblings while Fizzy and Lottie study for exams and his mum and stepdad visit his nan. Harry would have went — he _is_ the Tomlinson family’s preferred babysitter, after all — but he'd lied to Louis and told him he had a paper to finish.

The last tally mark he'd made on his napkin-turned-score sheet is light, barely there. Almost like he didn't want to count it, like the tally mark wasn't the real reason for the kiss in the first place. Compared to that first set of tally marks he and Louis put up, bold and stark against the cotton napkin, a statement made with pen and ink, these are nearly invisible.

Harry studies the tally marks with supreme concentration; they’ve not really stuck to the eight-a-day rule he’d figured out in the beginning. Some days he puts up twenty tally marks before he stumbles off to bed, some days he and Louis are so exhausted from school and work and footie and _life_ that they get in only one, maybe two. This isn’t a precise science and, as ever, it _is_ technically a race — if Harry gives one, he usually gets one.

What he needs now, he’s decided, is a way to make that slow down.

Not stop, no. But things are progressing quickly, way too quickly; it’s a week from his birthday and they’re nearing the 700 mark. That gives him, more or less, about five weeks left of guaranteed kisses from Louis.

It’s not enough.

Especially not now. Especially not with those Christmas kisses looming over them, an aftertaste of alcohol and chocolate and New Years promises. There’s something _there,_ something that makes the world seem a little more right when Harry’s lips are pressed to Louis than any other time when they’re not.

So Harry needs to make this whole thing slow down, and he needs to drag Louis along with him, because otherwise Louis would just race ahead and reach a thousand, and then he wouldn’t kiss Harry anymore even though Harry wasn’t finished.

He’ll have to be creative, but that’s okay. He’s going to have to lie, but it’s for the good of everyone, probably.

This stupid, infuriating, ridiculous bet is the reason Harry stumbled onto the fact that he’s in love with Louis and has been for a long, long time. It can’t end.

Harry won’t let it.

_689 - 685._

_________________

_February_

Louis scrambles into the kitchen, yanking his backpack straps onto his shoulders. He’s got a beanie jammed haphazardly on his head, and one shoe all the way on while the other flaps against the sole of his foot.

He steals the toast out of Harry’s hand, yells, “I’m late!” as though Harry doesn’t know how to read a clock, and then continues his hobbled sprint to the door, leaving a bemused silence in his wake.

Harry sips at his tea and goes back to his own leisurely breakfast (sans toast), but he’s hardly taken another bite when he hears a distinctive _ka-thunk, ka-thunk_ of someone running with only one shoe properly on. Louis reappears in the doorway again, breathing heavily, and then takes two (lopsided) steps across the room to Harry. He takes Harry by the cheeks and kisses him, a loud, long smack of lips, and then calls, “Can you mark that one down for me?” before disappearing once more.

(Harry doesn’t add it to the tally. But, to be fair, he doesn’t add his own he gets in return, either.)

_723 - 722_

__________________

“Don’t forget, essays are due next week!” the tutor calls as she dismissed the class, most of the students already standing and stuffing their notes and laptops into their bags.

“That was a dull one, wasn’t it?” Isaiah asks, yawning. He holds out a hand to help Harry to his feet, as always.

“Yeah,” Harry agrees. “Though while she was talking about Dickens, I did come up with a truly fantastic idea for the name of a cookbook for all the food Dickens mentions in his stories.”

“No you didn’t,” Isaiah laughs. “Go on, then, let’s hear it.”

“Okay,” Harry grins. “It’s called- Lou!”

“S’not very funny,” Harry hears Isaiah mutter behind him, but Louis is there shoving a cup of coffee into Harry’s hand and beaming like he’s made of sunlight.

“You brought me coffee,” Harry says, nudging Louis.

“Yeah, well, you made me breakfast,” Louis nudges him back, eyes crinkling.

“I always make you breakfast.”

“Well then, suppose I ought to always bring you coffee.”

“Suppose so,” Harry grins. “Hey, Lou, what would Charles Dickens call his cookbook?”

“Oh no,” Louis says, but he’s already smiling. “What would he call it, then?”

“ _The Best of Thymes, The Worst of Thymes.”_

Louis bursts out laughing, nearly spilling his own drink. “Oh, Harry, that’s terrible.”

“You laughed, it can’t be that bad.”

“It can, and it _was-”_

“Hey, Harry, I better go,” Isaiah cuts in.

“Oh, alright,” Harry says, lifting his arm automatically so Louis can fit against his hip. “Have a good day.”

As he walks away, Louis mumbles, “I still don’t like him,” and Harry smiles as he kisses Louis’ hair.

_735 - 738_

_______________

“Shouldn’t’ve… shouldn’t’ve had wine with dinner,” Louis says slowly, then laughs, his head dropping back to look at the ceiling.

“Wine with dinner is fine if you don’t refuse to share the bottle,” Harry points out bemusedly. He — like Niall and Liam — had a perfectly refined one glass with his takeaway pizza. Louis, clearly, did not stop there. His face is flushed, his eyelids heavy, and he looks half-asleep already where he’s curled up in his chair. “C’mon, Lou, let’s get you to bed.”

“D’wanna,” Louis refuses sleepily. His eyelashes brush against his cheeks, slow slow slow blinks.

“You have to. I’m not going to let you sleep at the table.”

“S’comfy, though.”

“I don’t think it is, actually,” Harry chuckles. He stands, and offers a hand to help Louis to his feet too. “C’mon.”

Louis swings his hand out and Harry grabs it, but when he heaves Louis out of the chair he crumples into a heap, giggling. “Whoops!”

“Oh my god,” Harry laughs, pinching the space between his eyes. “Okay.”

He squats down and fits his arms under Louis’ knees and shoulders, bracing himself before lifting Louis bodily off the floor. Louis mumbles a _wheee_ when Harry turns toward the door to the stairs — oh, god, the _stairs_ — but is otherwise quiet.

“Someday,” Harry huffs, searching with his foot to find the next step carefully so he doesn’t send himself and Louis crashing to the ground, “I’m going to make you pay for this.”

Louis, in a well-thought answer, snores, tucking his face against Harry’s neck and balling the front of Harry’s shirt in a loose fist.

“Right,” Harry huffs, smiling to himself and shaking his head. “Of course.”

He gets up the stairs eventually and neither of them have taken a terrible fall, so Harry counts that as a win. Louis doesn’t stir as Harry lays him in his bed, pulling the blankets up to his chest and brushing his hair off his face.

He leans down to press a kiss to Louis’ forehead, then lays a line of kisses down his temple and to his jaw, too. Then the other side, just so it’s even.

A kiss to Louis’ right shoulder, then his left. His collarbones, those get a few. His sternum, where Harry can hear Louis’ heartbeat pulse even in his lips.

“Cheating,” Louis murmurs above Harry’s head. Harry freezes, then sits up slowly.

“Sorry,” he whispers.

“Don’ be,” Louis whispers back. Then his eyelashes flutter and he’s asleep again.

_766 - 769._

_______________

Louis kisses Harry on the mouth, just a quick peck, and announces “Eight hundred!”

Harry smiles and returns the favor while he can before something else catches Louis’ attention, and then they’re even once more.

Eight hundred; Harry’s been short-changing the tallies for weeks now, but they’re still racing forward. Liam says it’s because they’re kissing now more than ever. Harry says Liam should shut up.

Eight hundred kisses, and it’s still not enough.

_800 - 800._

_______________

Louis’ footie team isn’t a uni one, just a club team he joined so he could run off his energy a couple of times a week. They do have real matches, though, and they’re decently good, so Harry, Liam, and Niall always go to the matches if they have time. The first one of the spring comes on a blustery February day, the sky ominously grey overhead, but Harry’s got an umbrella and a raincoat and wellies, so he’s ready for anything.

“Go, Louis!” he shouts as Louis races down the muddy pitch, the grass kicked up in clumps and littered with skids from tackles. It’s neck and neck, down to the wire, the referee glancing down at his watch every few seconds to prepare to call the final time. Louis is sprinting after the ball, his boots a blur, and he dances along the sideline to keep it in play. The whole assembled crowd is on its feet, cheering or booing respectively, fifty wives and girlfriends and boyfriends and kids and friends and coworkers of these men making fools of themselves as they cheer and stamp their feet for one more goal for either side to break the tie, just one more.

The referee puts his whistle to his mouth, and Louis puts his foot to the ball in a beautiful cross, sailing over the head of the defender barrelling towards him.

The crowd holds its breath as Louis’ teammate leaps into the air, his head connecting and sending the ball spinning madly in another direction.

Straight into the net.

“YES!” Liam shouts next to Harry, punching the air, “YEAHHH!”

“We did it, we did it!” Niall chants, hopping up and down.

Harry leaps from the little makeshift stands and races across the pitch, wellies slipping in the mud. Louis and his teammates are celebrating by yelling and flicking the V at the other team and swooping their girlfriends off the ground and swinging them around — Louis is in the middle of all that, a stone parting a stream, like he’s waiting for Harry.

They crash together lips first, kissing like Louis just brought home the World Cup trophy instead of nothing but glory and bragging rights. Louis is drenched with sweat and scattered rain and smells like wet grass and adrenaline, and Harry could drown himself in it.

“So good,” Harry says nonsensically. “Did so good.”

Louis just groans against his mouth, hands tangled in Harry’s hair. After a moment Harry scoops Louis up and Louis wraps his legs around Harry’s waist, his thighs burning through Harry’s rain jacket.

“Erm, fellas,” says one of Louis’ teammates. “We’ve got kids here.”

Louis just waves him off without disconnecting their mouths, and it takes Niall and Liam ten minutes to pry them apart, the pitch empty of anyone else around them.

_831 - 833._

_______________

_March_

Kiss nine hundred happens as Louis greets Harry after his Elizabethan Lit class, the same place where they always meet, the corner of the pavement between the library and the English building.

There’s no fanfare, no excited announcement of a race to the finish like Harry expected so long ago. They’re lagging behind schedule, thanks to Harry drawing this out as long as he possibly can, and only adding about every third kiss to his tally sheet. He doesn’t know how Louis hasn’t already finished, unless he’s doing the same thing and not counting all of his kisses, but he doesn’t want to ask and draw attention to it when he’s getting what he wants.

Or, at least, getting what he wants in theory.

He wonders what would happen if they just… _didn’t_ end the bet. If kiss number one thousand wasn’t the last one, or even a special one, because they would know more would come after it.

He wonders what would happen if this just kept going.

Maybe forever.

_897 - 900._

_______________

“Your total is-”

“I know what my total is, young man,” Mrs Bagman says, sniffing. “I’ve been coming here a very long time, you know.”

“Of course, Mrs Bagman,” Harry grins, taking her exact change. He hands her the printed receipt and she tucks it neatly away in her purse, just like always. Harry’s just about to wish her a pleasant evening when a familiar voice rings out.

“Hazza!” Louis calls, smiling widely. “And Mrs Bagman, hello.”

“Oh, hello dear,” Mrs Bagman flutters, withered cheeks going pink. “Here to see Harry?”

“If only,” Louis sighs dramatically. “I’m here for bread, we’re all out.”

“No we aren’t,” Harry frowns. “I brought some home yesterday.”

“Oh,” Louis says lightly. “I meant tea.”

“I bought you tea three days ago.”

“Frozen pizzas, then,” he tries, smile strained now.  

“We’ve got two already.”

“Salt.”

“No, don’t think so.”

“I am here for something,” Louis huffs, poking Harry right on the name badge, “and we don’t have it, because we’re out of it, and I will bring it back up here and you’ll know what I’m talking about.”

“Okay,” Harry says slowly. “Good.”

Louis spins on his heel and marches away. Harry turns back to Mrs Bagman, who has packed her things away but, since there’s no one waiting for her to move, has settled in to watch.

“He’s an idiot,” Harry mutters, watching Louis duck down different aisles.

“He missed you,” Mrs Bagman says knowingly, eyes twinkling behind her glasses.

“He’s here to bother me.”

“He’s here because we wanted to see you, but didn’t want to wait until he had an excuse.”

Louis stomps back up to Harry and holds out the items he’d hunted down: naan bread, eyedrops, a tin of sweetcorn, and three pears.

“We need all this?” Harry asks, eyebrows raised.

Louis’ eyes narrow. “Yes. We do.”

Harry pinches back his smile. “Okay. Sure, I can-”

“I don’t have any money,” Louis says over him. “So. Can you pay for these when you check out?”

He leans forward and smacks a kiss to Harry’s cheek, nearly dropping one of the pears, and jogs out the door.

“You can’t do that every time!” Harry yells after him in exasperation.

“Bye, Hazza!” comes the answer. “Love you!”

Mrs Bagman laughs as she carefully gathers her bags of cat food and beans. “You boys,” she says fondly, shaking her head. “So lucky to have each other.”

Harry doesn’t bother arguing, this time. He knows, even if she doesn’t have the particulars correct, that she’s right.

_912 - 911._

_______________

“You’re coming to Kat’s party, yeah?” Isaiah asks as they approach where Louis is standing, holding his now-usual two cups of coffee, his milk and no sugar, Harry’s sugar and no milk.

“Friday?” Harry asks, kissing Louis’ cheek in thanks as he takes the cup. “Haven’t decided yet. Are you going?”

“Party?” Louis asks.

“Yeah, Kat, she’s in our course, she’s throwing this party to celebrate, I don’t know, spring arriving or something,” Harry explains. “She’s cool, I just didn’t know if anything else was happening that night.”

“Oh,” Louis says, sipping his drink. “We should go!”

“Yeah?” Harry asks. “Okay, sure.” He turns back to Isaiah, smiling. “We’ll be there!”

“Cool,” Isaiah says faintly, as Harry presses another absent-minded kiss to Louis’ temple.

_928 - 931._

_______________

Kat really is one of the _coolest_ people Harry’s met at university, in the most literal sense of the word. She’s got ‘50s pinup tattoos covering her arms and shoulders, and she wears red eyeshadow and fake eyelashes just because she knows she looks good in it. She rides motorcycles and races rally cars and punched a guy in the face one time because he told her red lipstick is for whores.

She once told Harry, _The day I dress up for a man is the day they dress me to meet Jesus,_ and Harry decided right then and there that when he writes his dystopian novel, she’s going to be his protagonist.

So, of course her flat and her party are full of interesting people, like the tattoo artist who does his own ink and the professional stunt driver who goes to poetry slams on the weekends. Liam drags Harry over at one point to meet Kat’s friend Bob, who is a firefighter and who answers all of Liam’s excited questions with a bemused smile on his face. They lose Niall almost immediately, but that’s about the standard for them, so they let him go; Louis spots someone from his own course and makes his way over to them, telling Harry he’ll find him again later. There are a few people here that Harry recognises too, and Harry waves at Isaiah when he sees him, but otherwise he’s so busy meeting this horde of new people and introducing his friends around that he sort of forgets he’s here.

Until about two hours into the party, when Harry’s reaching for a beer and finds one already there in front of him, his hand closing around it automatically.

“Thanks,” he says, and looks up to find Isaiah standing nearby, watching him.

“You’re very welcome,” he says. “Good party.”

“It is, yeah,” Harry agrees, twisting the top off. “Kat’s place is amazing.”

“Yeah, it is,” Isaiah replies. “Did you see her bathroom yet?”

“No, not yet.”

“It’s got this mural of all these band stickers taking up a whole wall, it’s absolutely sick.”

“Cool,” Harry says fervently. After a second, he looks up to find Isaiah still watching him. “Hey. I guess I haven’t asked in a while, but how are things, man?”

“Things,” Isaiah muses. He shoves his light brown hair out of his eyes — it’s messy and tousled, now, even though he used to wear it pin-straight — and grins down at his shoes. “I don’t know how to answer that, really.”

“Oh?” Harry asks, brow furrowed. “Why not?”

“I…” Isaiah laughs, shakes his head. “I like this guy, see. Like, a lot.”

“That’s great,” Harry says.

“Well, sure. But he’s got this best friend.”

Oh no.

“And he and this best friend are, like, unbelievably close. Have been forever. And they aren’t dating, but they act like they are.”

“Isaiah.”

“Kissing all the time, stuff like that. And the best friend doesn’t like me, because he knows how I feel and he doesn’t want to share.” Another laugh. “Can’t blame him, I suppose.”

“Isaiah, please.”

Isaiah looks up, his eyes sad even with a smile still on his face. “I never had a chance, you know? I could never compete with that.”

Harry sighs, sets his bottle to the side.

“You shouldn’t have to,” he says quietly. “Isaiah, listen, someone out there is going to give you their full attention, not make you a second” — third, fourth, fifth, Harry corrects silently in his head, trying not to grimace as his mind helpfully collects all the times he blew Isaiah off, not just for Louis, but for Liam and Niall and Ed and Nick and one time for a friend he’d just met earlier that day. Isaiah was right, he never had a chance — “choice. You deserve that.”

“Maybe,” Isaiah shrugs.

“I can help,” Harry says, speaking quickly. “I have loads of friends I could set you up with, what’s your type? I can-”

“Can I-” Isaiah interrupts. He steps closer and Harry snaps his mouth shut, otherwise frozen. “Just. Just one time.”

And then he presses his lips to Harry’s.

 _Wrong_ . That’s all Harry can think at first, is _wrong._ He’s been kissing _right_ for five months now, he knows how lips should fit against his, he knows how hands should feel against his jaw, his chest. Isaiah’s lips are soft but not the _right_ soft; his hands gentle but not in the right way. The height difference is wrong, the smell is wrong, not bad, just wrong, and it echoes in Harry’s head, _not Louis not Louis not Louis not-_

“Well,” says a blank voice from the doorway. “Sorry to interrupt.”

“Louis!” Harry says, wrenching himself away from Isaiah, but the kitchen door is already swinging shut. Harry stumbles, panic and beer mixing badly in his blood, and when he makes it out into the living room Liam and Niall are already there, waiting, their faces worried.

“What happened?” Liam urges.

“He- he saw,” Harry gasps. He doesn’t know what asthma feels like, is it a cavey-in chest feeling? Because his ribcage feels like it holds a black hole. “Me. Isaiah. Kissing.”

“You kissed someone else?” Niall yelps.

“Oh, is that the one Louis hates that’s in love with you?” Liam asks, comprehension dawning. “Do you like him, then?”

“No, I don’t- I mean, he’s a nice guy, but-” Harry runs his hands through his hair. “Not the time, Liam!”

“Just trying to be supportive,” Liam sniffs. “Okay, well, Louis ran out the door so we were coming to get you to go look for him anyway.”

“He _left?”_ Harry asks. “Oh, god, oh no.”

At that moment, his phone buzzes in his pocket. He pulls it out, seeing Louis’ distinctive line of emojis next to his name on the screen.

“Oh, thank-” Harry says, but then he opens the messages.

 **_Louis:_ ** _kiss him all you want_

Harry’s fingers fly across the screen to answer.

 **_Harry:_ ** I don’t want! At all!  
**_Harry:_ ** Where are you??  
**_Harry:_ ** _Louis, it didn’t mean what you thought, I promise.  
_ Read 1:11 AM

“Shit,” Liam mutters, looking over Harry’s shoulder. Harry’s phone buzzes again, so he unlocks it frantically to see Louis’ answer.

 **_Louis:_ ** _it doesn’t count for the bet ._

 _“What?”_ Harry asks, dazed.

“This is a mess,” Niall groans. “C’mon, we have to go home.”

Harry leads the way to the door, fairly sprinting down the stairs and out onto the street; the conversation took too long, and Louis is nowhere in sight.

“Shit,” Harry curses under his breath; he’d been hoping that Louis might’ve just been stress-smoking and was going to come back, or some other kind of miracle. No such luck.

“C’mon,” Niall repeats, and they start a half-jog back to the flat. Harry’s heart is racing, but moving helps. Moving feels like doing something, and doing something is better than nothing.

“Thanks,” Harry says when they’re almost there, feet pounding on the pavement. “You didn’t have to- but thanks.”

“We told you months ago,” Liam says, reaching over to pat Harry’s back. “We’ve been waiting for this. Whatever needs to happen, we’ll make happen.”

Harry sniffs, grabbing Liam’s arm. “You’re gonna make me cry.”

“Save it,” Liam shoves him gently forward, to the stairs leading to their front door. “We’ll be out here.”

“Wait,” Harry says, his chest seizing. “Wait. What if- what if he doesn’t want this. What if it’s just been a bet to him all along?”

“Harry,” Niall says, brow furrowed. “Do you think if we thought that, we’d be telling you to go?”

“This has never been one-sided, H,” Liam says quietly. “Listen, this is a bet, right? Well, play the odds.”

Harry scoffs, frustrated. “What? That’s just a saying, Liam, it doesn’t apply here.”

“It does too. Listen. Play the odds — odds are, Louis is up there waiting for you to come back and explain why you did what you did. And odds are, he’s spent the last few months carrying the same feeling you have inside his own self. And, of course, odds are you’ll be okay at the end of this. Win, lose, draw, you’ll be okay.”

At those words, Harry’s hit with a rush of- of something. Something ominous in its size, something that would blot out the sun in the daytime. Certainty, Harry thinks, that’s what it is. Certainty and a belief like a burning piece of coal in his chest that Liam’s right. That this is right.

Play the odds.

Harry turns, exhales slowly, and opens the door.

It’s dark inside the flat, silent and echoing. Louis’ shoes haven’t been kicked off in the doorway for anyone to trip over, but that doesn’t mean he’s not here; he only does that when he’s feeling mischievous and wants to see Harry’s face go red.

 _Maybe that’s because he doesn’t want to see your face at all,_ Harry’s mind supplies, but he shakes that away, not letting it stick. He waited too long to tell Louis how he felt, but he can fix this. The words he’s been holding onto must’ve been shaken loose by Isaiah’s mouth, or by Harry’s stomach dropping when he read Louis’ texts — either way, they’re there now, honey on Harry’s tongue that he hopes won’t sour because he never gets to say them.

It’s silent except a _click,_ pause, _click_ Harry hears coming from upstairs. The steps creak underneath his feet and the _click,_ pause, _click_ ing doesn’t stop, so Harry assumes he’s supposed to follow the sound.

Louis is sitting on his bed, flipping his lighter open ( _click_ ), watching the flame go for a second (pause), then snapping the lid shut again ( _click_ ). It’s otherwise dark in his room, the streetlamp outside pouring light in that gets cut into slices by the shutters. He’s got his knees pulled up to his chest, and this is the first time in twelve years that Harry can remember thinking Louis looked small.

“Must not have been that good at it,” he says mildly, _click,_ pause, _click,_ “if you’re finished with him already.”

“I’m not finished with anything,” Harry answers automatically, then reels himself back and tries again. “There’s nothing _to_ finish. Isaiah was just-”

“Yeah, I heard. Jealous best friend wants you all to himself, so the guy had no choice but to try something crazy.”

“You heard?” Harry asks, sinking onto the bed in relief. “Good, so you know I didn’t start this.”

“No, you didn’t,” Louis agrees. The little flame lights up his whole face for quick seconds, orange back into darkness back to orange. He’s got an unlit cigarette tucked behind his ear. “I did.”

“You-” Harry starts, frowning. “No, Isaiah started it.”

“No,” Louis laughs hollowly. “I promise I started it.” Now he takes the cigarette and lights it, but doesn’t put it to his mouth, just letting it dangle there. “Do you remember the night we made the bet?”

“Yeah?”

“No, not in the bathroom the next morning. I mean actually making the bet. Do you remember?”

Harry slowly draws one of his knees up to his chest as well. “No, not the actual bet.”

“It was my idea,” Louis says, flicking a little bit of ash from the end of the cigarette onto the floor.

“I didn’t think you remembered either,” Harry says.

“No, I do. I remember. I wasn’t that drunk,” he grins at Harry, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “You said you were a better kisser than me and at first I was just joking, playing along, but. Well. Seemed like an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.”

“An opportunity for what?” Harry asks, frustration bubbling over. “Louis, come on. What are you talking about?”

“Every time we ever kissed before this bet started,” Louis says instead of answering, “I initiated it. D’you ever notice? I kissed you first when I was thirteen, and fifteen, and twenty. In all those years, you kissed me first one time.”

“The night before you left for uni,” Harry answers quietly.

“Exactly. The night before the biggest day of my life thus far, and I spent it lying awake thinking about how you kissing me for the first time ruined everything.”

Harry’s stomach rolls horribly. _“What?”_  

“Oh, yeah,” Louis says. “Before that, you were just Harry, my best mate. So what if we kissed sometimes when I wanted to try something out, and you were a willing partner? That was nothing, kid stuff. So what if you were the only person I wanted to spend time with, or that Jason Sambora and every other boyfriend who followed didn’t break up with me because I was too clingy, or stubborn, or angry, but because I spent every moment with them thinking about you? So what? It didn’t mean anything. That’s what I thought.”

Harry’s mouth drops open. His heart hammers in his chest. He doesn’t understand, does that- does that mean-

“And then you kiss me and,” Louis smiles, a real smile this time, “and suddenly I knew you weren’t just my best mate, but you were also the only person I’d ever really wanted. In every way. Every _conceivable_ way that I could have you, that’s how I wanted you. And I was leaving.”

“Louis,” Harry gets out.

“And I spent two years at uni waiting for you to get here, going home on holidays and weekends to see you and talking to you on the phone about the guys you were seeing or the things you were doing, waiting for the moment to be right to just come out and say it. But then I realised, you would come to uni and it wouldn’t be Manchester all over. London is big, London is a _universe_ — there are a thousand people on every street who you hadn’t met yet. Who was I to stake any sort of claim because I happened to be lucky enough to know you first?”

Something is filling Louis’ eyes, making his vision waver. Something salty that streams down Harry’s face in rivers, in waves. _“Lou.”_

“So I decided best friends was enough, god, more than enough. And I dated Eric, and Tommy, and Antonio, and they weren’t right for me so I didn’t bother trying too hard to hold onto them. And you were happy. Weren’t you? Happier than I’d every seen you, out among everyone who was just as interesting as you. And then you,” he nudges Harry with his toe, “lean across the table at me, drunk off your arse, smiling like sunshine, and tell me you’re a better kisser than me. And I couldn’t resist.”

The cigarette is half-ash now, the embers red and hot like how Harry feels inside his skin. All this time, _all this time,_ and he never knew. Never even guessed that Louis could feel half of what he feels, only to find out Louis has been here all along, waiting for him to catch up. Climbing down into a cavern Harry’s only just now realising how far down it stretches.

So, here Harry is. Catching up.

Playing the odds.

Harry launches across the bed at Louis, knocking him backwards and sealing their mouths together. He steals the cigarette from Louis’ fingers and grinds it out on the floorboards, the smoky air mixing with Louis’ raspy, surprised gasp.

“I didn’t know,” Harry says wildly, leaving a scratch across Louis’ chest as he tears his shirt from his torso, yanking it over Louis’ head. “I didn’t know, I didn’t- _Lou.”_

Louis’ chest is shiny with stress sweat and heaving, the scratch welting already. His collarbones jut like bridges, his hips roll like hills; Harry’s seen this all before, a hundred times over, but not from this angle, not in this light.

“I’m just now-” Harry continues, words spilling out against Louis’ skin as he leans down, fluttering kisses to Louis’ hipbones. “I’m just now- now figuring it — _oh, god —_ out,” he babbles. “But I didn’t, I don’t-”

Louis makes a noise Harry didn’t know people could make, an impatient, needy, _growl_ of a noise that boils over from his throat into the room. He locks his legs around Harry’s back and throws his weight sideways, switching their positions so Harry’s gasping up at him, Louis silhouetted in starlight over him.

“Lou,” Harry breathes.

“Finish that sentence,” Louis gets out. He finds Harry’s wrists and pins them to the mattress, eyes darker than anything else in the moon-drenched room. “Say it.”

Harry whines low in his throat, wiggling his hips where Louis has him pinned with strong thighs. “God,” he says.

“Try again.”

Harry throws his head back, the words lost again but this time not hidden by fear, but coated and covered in longing so he can’t get a hold of them. His head is a mess, he couldn’t possibly put them in the right order. But he tries, gathering them up and throwing them out for Louis to see, a crapshoot for all the stakes.

_Play the odds._

“I didn’t know- didn’t know that you looked at me like that because you love me,” he stammers. His eyes fall shut because he can’t look at Louis right now, his head overwhelmed and his heart too frantic as it is. “And now I’m rethinking everything I ever saw or thought I saw or thought I _knew._ I didn’t _know,_ and I…”

“Go on,” Louis says, squeezing Harry’s wrists again. It’s not forceful, but an _I’m here. I’m still here._

“I thought I’d know what love was like when I found it,” he says shakily. “I did, I thought everyone else was being ridiculous when they said they didn’t know for sure.” He takes a deep breath and opens his eyes, staring up at Louis, who’s biting his lip and looks just as scared as Harry feels. “But it turns out I’ve been in love with you since before I even knew you, and I’m still figuring out what that means every single day.”

“You love me,” Louis repeats unsteadily.

Harry settles, because it’s true. Maybe he wasn’t able to catch the words because he still didn’t quite believe them; hearing the truth in Louis’ voice seals it. He nods, quiet and still.

**“And you love me.”**

Louis takes a deep, gasping breath and dives forward, his mouth connecting with Harry’s for their possibly-thousandth kiss, who knows; no matter the number their lips slide like it’s habit. Harry can’t help but sigh at the familiar feeling of Louis against him, the particular cut of his teeth and curl of his tongue; earlier was wrong but this is right and real and _good,_ a dance Harry knows, that he has mastered.

Harry’s fingers find the button of Louis’ jeans and he scrambles them open, the dip of the vee of Louis’ hips shadowy and perfect. He’s not going to get Louis naked until he gets him off of his waist, but Louis has his own mission: his fingers are flying down Harry’s shirt, buttons sliding out of buttonholes and the fabric parting around Harry’s stomach.

“God,” Louis moans appreciatively. “You’ve no idea how long I’ve waited.”

“I do,” Harry disagrees, hands smoothing greedily over Louis’ arse. “I do, I know.”

“Can you fuck me?” Louis asks breathlessly, and then, before Harry can answer, “Or I’ll fuck you. Or I blow you. _God,_ I want to do _everything.”_

“I’ll fuck you,” Harry agrees, reaching back up to pull Louis to him, pushing the words into his mouth. “I’ll fuck you, Louis, yes, please.”

“God,” Louis says again. He scrambles off of his perch on Harry’s hips and leaps toward the bedside table, his jeans drooping open and sliding down his hips to reveal a pair of red briefs that Harry recognises from the last time he did laundry. As Louis digs in the drawer for lube, probably, Harry reaches out and pushes the jeans further down so he can get a better look. He rolls onto his stomach and folds his fingers under the edges of Louis’ briefs, tugging them down a little at a time until Louis’ cock springs free, hard and heavy and so wide that Harry gets a bit of a head rush.

“What’re you-” Louis says distractedly, but then looks over at Harry and stops digging. “Oh.”

“Can,” Harry says, swallowing. His eyes feel very wide, his cheeks very red. “Can I suck you? Louis, oh my god. Please?”

“Fuck, Haz,” Louis laughs in bewilderment. “You think I’m going to turn you down when you look like that?”

Harry doesn’t care how he looks; he heard _yes_ and so he reaches over and wraps his hand around the base of Louis’ cock, using it to guide Louis to where the fronts of his thighs touch the mattress. He’s at the perfect height for Harry, cock at Harry’s eye level like they were made for this position. Harry leans forward and fits his mouth around the tip, hollowing his cheeks and putting his hands on Louis’ arse to urge him forward, forward, forward, _there._

Wooziness hits Harry like a train; he’d always liked giving blowjobs, but this one already might be his favorite. Louis is thick enough to fill his throat, a heaviness that makes every bit of Harry ache. The wooziness intensifies into spiralling, wildfire arousal when Louis pushes a hand through Harry’s hair and rolls his hips.

“Baby,” Louis says, and that’s new, but it’s everything Harry could’ve asked for. “Harry, _fuck.”_

Harry hasn’t even _started_ yet. He widens his mouth and looks up at Louis, sending as clear a message as he can. _Go._

Louis gets it.

Louis sets a slow, pulsing rhythm that’s just hard enough that Harry knows he won’t be able to talk tomorrow, but not so hard he’ll be bruised. (Next time, maybe.) He relaxes his lips and his throat and just holds on, hands squeezing Louis’ bum and feeling it flex with each thrust, his tongue working along the vein on the underside of Louis’ cock. When Louis pulls out Harry presses his tongue to the bundle of nerves right under the head, making Louis jerk the first few times but then melt into it, hips hitching so that Harry can stay at that place longer.

“Not gonna,” Louis gasps, “not gonna last, Haz.”

He pulls out of Harry’s mouth, leaving it disappointingly empty, but Harry hums when Louis slips a few fingers there instead. With his other hand he rummages around inside the drawer again, pulling out a tube of lube. He rolls Harry to the middle of the bed and yanks his jeans down, baring heated skin to the cool night air and Louis’ waiting mouth, kisses pressed to the the creases of his thighs, his jutting hipbones.

Harry reaches for the lube but Louis keeps it out of reach, his grin appearing. “Not this time,” he says breathlessly. “I need you in me, and I don’t want to wait.”

So instead, Harry lies pinned and watches, wide-eyed, as Louis reaches back behind himself, his shoulders drawing up tight and his eyes squeezing shut. He lets out a shuddery breath and Harry see the moment his finger slips inside himself, his breath catching.

“You are,” Harry breathes reverently, _“everything.”_

Louis laughs softly, eyes still closed, rolling his head on his neck. His shoulder works and his muscles loosen right in front of Harry’s eyes, his movements loose as he adds more lube and a second finger.

Harry can’t stand it; he reaches around Louis and touches where his fingers are moving in and out of himself. Louis gasps but doesn’t make him stop, so Harry touches the warm, slick rim, and then, just barely, pushes the tip of his finger in next to Louis’ three.

 _“Fuck,”_ Louis yelps, body drawing up tight again. Harry keeps pushing until his finger is all the way in, staying still where it’s pressed against the inside of Louis’ body as his own three fingers work mercilessly.

“Lou,” Harry breathes. “C’mon, let’s go.”

Louis pulls his fingers out and unwraps a condom, sliding it onto Harry’s aching cock and slicking him with lube quickly and efficiently as Harry arches desperately into his fleeting touch. That done, Louis slips forward, leaning up onto his knees so that the tip of Harry’s cock just brushes the hot skin of his arse.

“Ready?” Louis asks.

Harry wasn’t ready.

He’s been ridden before, hell, he’s been ridden _well_ before, but nothing compares to this. Harry feels like he’s being fucked more than the one doing the actual fucking, his body merely there for Louis to do as he pleases. It’s heady and overwhelming, and Harry’s sobbing with pleasure in seconds, gasping by the second time Louis twists down until his bum meets Harry’s hips. He has no concept of time as his body meets Louis’ over and over; the night air hot around them when before he could’ve sworn it was cool; the sound of Louis’ voice, exaltant and sweet, praising Harry for things Harry doesn’t even realise he’s doing.

They fuck like two people who’ve been together forever; they make love like this is the first time of a million; they’re caught somewhere in the middle, pinned and fluid. The night is silver and sharp around them, edges shiny and heady. Their sounds mingle in the air like some sort of symphony; Louis’ high rasp and Harry’s deep, needy moans twisting around each other.

Louis’ hips undulate in an unbroken rhythm, and he’s clearly found the spot inside himself that is making his nerve endings light up like he’s been touched by an electric current. His noises are constant now, a light, needy _ah-ah-Harry-baby_ that drives Harry _mad._

 _“Oh,”_ Louis gasps out when he angles particularly well. “Oh, oh, _yes,_ there, _Harry!”_

Harry thrusts upward and catches Louis as he falls, crying out, spilling hot pulses across Harry’s stomach. He curls against Harry’s chest, shivering and clenching around Harry’s still-hard cock.

“You c’n,” Louis slurs, eyes fluttering open.

Harry rolls them over, putting Louis’ back against the mattress. He’s sleepy soft under Harry, warm and welcoming and he clenches again, this time on purpose. He tilts his head and looks up at Harry as though to say _what’ve you got?_

Harry’s exhausted and so full of _something_ — love? need? happiness? all three? — that he can hardly move, but Louis is looking at him like _that_ and there’s a reason Harry agreed to the bet all those months ago. He maneuvers Louis’ knees over his own shoulders, then asks, “Ready?”

If he wasn’t ready before, neither is Louis now.

The angle doesn’t hit Louis’ prostate, which is good because he’s so sensitive it would probably hurt, but it does let Harry go as deep as possible. Louis’ shoulders are against the mattress but his chest down to his hips are arched off the bed, muscles pulled tight. Harry’s thrusts are sloppy but it doesn’t matter, because they’re drawing some of the sweetest sounds Harry has ever heard out of Louis.

He’s hard again within a few minutes, and Harry reaches down to get a hand around him and pull him off for a second time, the aftershocks stronger this time as Louis shivers, his face slack with pleasure.

“C’mon,” Louis mumbles, “c’mon Harry.”

Harry does as he’s told; he thrusts, thrusts again, and he’s gone, white swirling through his vision as his muscles twinge and tingle.

Harry collapses down on top of Louis, who _oof_ s in surprise.

“Love you,” Harry mumbles.

“Yeah,” Louis murmurs back. “Love you too.”

_957 - 960._

_______________

_April_

A few months ago at this time, Harry would’ve been down in the kitchen, shoveling bacon and eggs onto a plate for a sleepy Louis, trading yawns and carefully counted kisses back and forth.

Now, Harry stays in bed a little later, though he has a good excuse; Louis is curled up against his chest, tracing the curve of his bicep with a sweeping, tired finger.

It’s a quiet, bright morning; Niall’s already gone for the day, and Liam’s puttering around in the kitchen, if the muted sound of kitchen cupboards opening and closing is anything to go by. Sunlight falls warm across the bed, and Harry has absolutely no desire to be anywhere but right here.

He leans down and kisses Louis’ hair, utterly content.

“One thousand,” Louis mumbles.

“Hmm?”

“That was one thousand,” Louis repeats, rolling over to face Harry. “According to your score sheet, anyway.”

“Was it really?” Harry muses, running a soft hand through Louis’ messy bedhead. “I was putting about half the tallies we actually needed in the last few weeks, so I figure we actually passed a thousand a long time ago.”

Louis snorts, burying his face in Harry’s shoulder. “You were cheating? Harry, you terrible person.”

Harry shrugs, unapologetic. “Didn’t want you to stop kissing me.” Louis’ smile widens, his eyes bright. “What?”

“When I wrote our tally marks on the score sheets, I did them in pencil so I could go back and erase some of them later,” he admits.

 _“Louis,”_ Harry gasps, faux-scandalised, then pulls his boyfriend closer. He traces a path up Louis’ spine, his bare skin warm under the blanket. Then, suddenly, something occurs to him. “Wait a minute.”

“What?”

“That means I won,” Harry says, grinning widely. “I was the first one to a thousand, officially. I won.”

Louis sits up, his eyes narrowed. “You did not.”

“I win,” Harry repeats gleefully. “I finally win a bet!”

“No,” Louis says. “No!”

“I win!”

“You do _not!”_

There’s a short scuffle as Louis clambers onto Harry, sitting on his thighs and trying to twist his nipples. Harry laughs and bats his hands away, arm shielding his upper chest from Louis’ quick fingers.

“I always knew I could do it,” Harry says through the attack. “And I could do it again, too.”

Louis stills above him, eyes bright. “Wanna bet?”

Harry grins back at him, and then tugs Louis down for a warm, lingering kiss.

“That’s one,” he whispers when they break apart.

_1 - 0._

**Author's Note:**

> j's original prompt post is [here](http://paynner.tumblr.com/post/153730290530/paynner-au-where-harry-and-louis-are-best) if you wanna see what i started with.
> 
> i'd be completely remiss if i didn't link [a quiet murmuration](https://archiveofourown.org/works/275828), which is an incredible fic from a different fandom that works with a slightly different prompt, and was a huge inspiration. 
> 
> [find me on tumblr](http://alivingfire.tumblr.com/) | [reblog the fic post](http://alivingfire.tumblr.com/post/154810672646) thank you all you lovely people! <3 <3


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